Academics against arts courses in engineering colleges

The Anna University Teachers’ Association (AUTA) on Monday said that permission should be given only to engineering colleges that suffer unsustainability due to low enrolment of students.

“After giving up their affiliation with engineering universities, the engineering colleges could change into Arts and Science colleges,” AUTA president Arul Aram said on Monday.

Stating that engineering and arts courses cannot be conducted in parallel, he said engineering courses deserve special calibre and mind set, like arts and sciences courses, which also deserve a different calibre.

“Unless the focus is purely on engineering courses, an engineering institution cannot flourish,” he said, adding that “we should not add on extra baggage which does not add to the institution’s progress.”

He said if the institutions “blindly obey” the rules and add on arts and science courses, the value for engineering will be a thing of the past. “Sometimes, arts students feel inferior when compared to engineering students, if they are in the same campus,” he added.

Arul stressed that private engineering colleges, which are collecting more fees from students, will tend to charge exorbitant amounts for arts and science courses as well.

AICTE, which plans to introduce arts courses in engineering colleges, aims to utilise idle classrooms that are a result of poor patronage for engineering courses. The classrooms meant for engineering courses could be used for arts and science courses, announced AICTE.

The council is planning to introduce the new scheme in the 2020-2021 academic year. Engineering colleges that would like to launch arts and basic science courses were instructed to apply to the council and share their feedback.