Round I: No takers for over 12,600 engg seats

There were no takers for over 12,600 seats — that is nearly 30 per cent — after the first round of admission for degree engineering courses in the state came to an end on Friday.

According to information given by the Admission Committee for Professional Courses (ACPC), 54,891 students had filled up their preferences and they were allocated seats at the completion of first round of the admission process. Of them, 42,687 have been confirmed seat allocation. So, the number of total seats remaining vacant crossed 12,600 including another 400 since the process began. The figures are based on the 75 per cent of the total seats on which ACPC gives admission. Colleges are responsible for admission for the remaining 25 per cent.

The number of vacant seats has come as a big surprise as colleges had been expecting a huge rush for admission in engineering.In fact, expectations had soared following the outstanding, rather historic, performance in Class XII science this year.

Also, apart from the Gujarat Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Board (GSHSEB), the state technical education department this year has decided to give equal opportunities to students from other education boards like Central Board of Secondary Education, International Baccalaureate (IB), etc. Inclusion of these students, however, does not seem to have made any difference at all.

ACPC officials claimed that most of the toppers would have preferred to join national institutes of repute like the Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) and the National Institute of Technology (NIT) among others. They, however, hoped that students, left out in the first round, would again try their fate in the second round of admission beginning on July 8.

“In the second round, those who could not participate will come. But, even if another 5,000 seats are filled up, around 6,000 to 7,000 seats will still remain vacant,” said ACPC member-secretary M N Patel. Last year, around 8,000 seats remained vacant from around 55,000 seats. This year, around 62,000 seats in degree engineering colleges of the state are up for grabs.

Former syndicate member of Gujarat University, Manish Doshi, however, felt that the reason for the large number of vacant seats was due to the poor quality of college education in the state.

“The Gujarat government has always focused on establishment and expansion and never on the improvement of education. When colleges in Gujarat are not known for quality education, students will move out to study engineering. Has any of the colleges from Gujarat figured in the top 10 national list? None. That is because the government has focused on commercialising education and not on quality,” lamented Doshi.