3,480 more engineering seats in Gujarat

The news might come as a cheer for students wanting to become engineers. The All India Committee for Technical Education (AICTE) has granted permission to increase seats for various engineering disciplines in 27 institutes across the state. This will mean 3,480 more seats in mechanical, automobile, civil and electrical engineering in state.

According to the details available with the Admission Committee for Professional Courses (ACPC), permission has been granted for increase of 1,320 seats in mechanical, 300 in automobile, 630 in civil, 780 in electrical, 60 in computer engineering, 60 in instrumentation and 30 in chemical engineering.

Sources close to the development state that permission for 300 seats has also been granted to two new colleges, one in Navrachna University and one in Ahmedabad University,. Officials also state that there are some colleges where number of seats has been reduced. This includes a cut of 180 engineering seats in a college in Moyad and 60 seats in bio-medical course.

According to a senior official, the move to increase seats has come as surprise as around 6,000 seats remained vacant in last year's admission procedure. It has also been pointed out that a great number of seats remained vacant in engineering disciplines despite the admission criterion being lowered to 45% for general category and 40% for reserved category students.

"Increase in seats might worsen the situation for engineering branch. If last year, 6,000 seats remained vacant, there are chances that 9,000 seats will remain vacant this year," said a senior official in ACPC. As per data available, there are more than 43,000 degree engineering seats.

Senate member in GU, Dr Manish Doshi said that increase of engineering seats is not a problem for Gujarat. "There is need to improve quality of technical education in Gujarat. The seats are being increased keeping in mind requirement of engineers. Students will repent if the quality of education is not improved ," said Doshi.