Engineering education: India
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2017, BTech: Computer science losing out to ‘Mechanical’
Versatile Job Openings Key To New Trend
Engineering is being revisited. Even as seats in this professional course are reducing across the country (from 16.3 lakh in 2013-14 to about 14.7 lakh this year), mechanical engineering seems to be emerging as the hottest pick in times of uncertainty in the IT and software industry .
While engineering continues to be a big draw, its 70odd options undergo a life cycle of their own. Experts say industry growth, which translates into more jobs and higher incomes, is what de cides the path that colleges and students take. And many feel the sun is setting on the computer science engineering stream. While 25.44% of all students opted for it in 2013-14, that has dropped to around 24% this year.
At the same time, mechanical engineering is racing ahead after pipping electronics and communications, which used to be the second most popular choice for four years. While 20.22% of students chose mechanical engineering in the past four years, that proportion has increased to 21.6% now.
Core courses like civil and electrical engineering are also expected to be top on the charts.
Although data from the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) shows that seats in undergraduate engineering are reducing, experts feel the course will continue to have lakhs of takers. “Engineering has become a broad-based course like BA, BCom and BSc. From here, students go on to do several courses,“ says IIT-Madras director Bhaskar Ramamurthy .
“Mechanical engineering is a great branch. One can fit into a lot of industries after ME,“ adds Ramamurthy. “ But given some amount of uncertainty in the IT sector, there are more takers for mechanical-because mechanical students can join IT companies, but the reverse is not possible.“
G D Yadav, vice-chancellor of the Institute of Chemical Technology , says mechanical is rising in popularity because manufacturing industry needs these engineers. “There is so much new construction, new infrastructure, machinery and mechanical engineers are needed everywhere.“
2017: 54% seats in private colleges vacant
Engineering education in the country seems to have reached a saturation point with around 54% of undergraduate and postgraduate seats in private engineering colleges across the country, or 8.67 lakh seats of 16.07 lakh seats, not finding takers in 2016-17, data put out by Lok Sabha on Monday revealed. For the 2017-18 academic year, these institutions took back around 96,000 seats. The number of private engineering colleges were also fewer by 83. All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) chairman D Sahasrabuddhe had, in April, said that 275 engineering colleges in the country had applied for closure.
In comparison, only 28% of seats (41,551) in government engineering colleges went vacant in 2016-17. In the current year, 6,151 seats were added in government colleges whose total went up from 411to 429, the data said.
The maximum vacancies were in private colleges in Himachal Pradesh (83%), Uttarakhand (74.23%), Haryana (73.32%), Rajasthan (69.68 %) and Uttar Pradesh (67.33%).In absolute terms, Tamil Nadu topped the list with 1.55 lakh seats going empty followed by Andhra Pradesh (99,286), Telangana (87,454) and Maharashtra (78,468).
Demand for engineering education
2012-15: 20 Odisha colleges almost empty
The Times of India, Aug 15 2015
Ashok Pradhan
Not even 10 takers for seats in 20 Odisha engg colleges
At the end of the engineering admission process across Odisha, around 20 colleges failed to reach the double digits in student intake raising serious doubts about their future. Around 30,000 of the total 46,000 BTech seats remain vacant. While this has been the trend for the past three years, the situation was never this bad.
Shyam Sundar Patnaik, vice-chancellor of Biju Patnaik University of Technology , to which the engineering colleges are affiliated, said he would review the situation and take a call. “While students' interest can't be compromised, we also have to think of the entrepreneurs who have opened the institutions,“ he said.
The admission to engineer ing colleges is conducted by the Odisha Joint Entrance Examination Committee, an independent body , and BPUT has no role to play in it. Though engineering seats lying vacant is a national phenomenon, especially in Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Maharashtra and Telengana, there are certain specific reasons behind the poor admission record in Odisha.
The Odisha Professional Education Act, 2007, bars engineering colleges in the state from admitting more than 15% students from outside the state. “Maybe when the Act was passed, such a cap on admitting outside state students was appropriate. Personally , I feel, the government should review the Act to accommodate more nonOdisha students against vacant seats,“ the VC said.
Secondly , counselling in Odisha is done after other states and universities. “Within the state also, private and deemed universities conduct their admission way before BPUT,“ said Odisha private engineering college association secretary Binod Dash.
NIT Rourkela director Sunil Sarangi said it was a cause of serious concern. “Running these courses will not be financially viable,“ he added. Sarangi said the government must take steps to strengthen school education and reduce dropout rate.
2013: Declining demand
GEEK TRAGEDY: PLOT WEAKENS
(In the 1990s and the first decade of the 21st century), engineering education was booming in the country but now colleges are closing and thousands of seats have no takers. Sunday Times finds out how quality lost out to quantity
Hemali Chhapia | TNN
The Times of India 4 Aug 2013
Rangareddy in Telangana region is just about half the size of Pune. But this district of Andhra Pradesh could well be called India’s engineering headquarters. Its narrow lanes boast of over 500 engineering colleges, the largest concentration of such campuses anywhere in the world.
In the last 15 years, colleges mushroomed here on farmland. And the multiplier effect seen in Rangareddy was witnessed across the country as India came to become an engineernation with its 3,800 campuses that have an annual student intake capacity of 1.7 million. In 1947 there were only 38 engineering institutions with a total of 2,500 seats. 60 years on, in 2007, India’s 1,503 engineering colleges had 5.83 lakh seats on offer. “In 2013, India added a total of 1.3 lakh new seats in various engineering colleges,” says S S Mantha, chairman of the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), the apex body that monitors the opening and running of professional colleges in the country.
But the glory days may have passed. Reports of vacant seats (80,000 in Tamil Nadu; 70,000 in MP; 50,000 in Maharashtra; and 7,800 in Gujarat), and colleges applying for closure are being seen as signs of interest in the field waning. The mood across campuses is gloomy, as placements have been slow and salaries lower. This is largely a result of the deceleration in the IT industry, which had fuelled the boom, and in manufacturing, which has also registered negative growth. “Capacity that was created in anticipation of demand remained unutilized because the economy failed us,” says National Institute of Technology Rourkela director Sunil Kumar Sarangi.
Students now know that all engineering colleges are not equal. Among the biggest concerns is the quality of teaching staff and curricula updated to industry requirements. Many colleges rely on visiting faculty, and teachers often do not have the prerequisite PhDs. An educationist from Tamil Nadu, who has advertised the sale of his four-year-old college, explains that given the AICTE prerequisites, setting up a college (which includes acquiring a certain amount of land, building labs and a library, acquiring university affiliation and hiring teachers among others) is hugely expensive. So until the college recovers those costs, most educators don’t even think of quality. Reportedly, in a 10-year business plan of establishing an institute, quality improvement comes in the fifth or sixth year.
Mantha admits that AICTE is increasingly receiving applications from colleges wanting to close down, but that is not an indication that the sheen of engineering is dulling. “What is happening is that students from rural regions are moving to the cities where they have a better scope of being placed. Colleges in the interior parts that do not have enough teachers or infrastructure are closing down,” he says, adding, “When an 18-year-old looks at his life three years on, he realizes that the chances of bagging a job are the highest if he or she pursues engineering.”
2013-14: 1.3 lakh engineering seats reduced
The Times of India, Dec 11 2015
Atul Thakur Engg colleges have cut 1.3L seats since 2013-14
When 23 lakh candi dates, including 2.2 lakh engineers, ap plied for 368 posts of peons in Uttar Pradesh recently , the story obviously grabbed headlines. Little wonder that the bleak future of engineering graduates is getting reflected in falling student intake and courses offered by engineering colleges. In the three years be tween 2013-14 and 2015-16, engineering colleges have reduced the number of seats by a staggering 1.3 lakh. The student intake has also declined in the same proportion.
More than 23,000 of these seats were reduced because of shutting down of 71 engineering colleges while another 1,279 colleges decreased the number of courses offered for engineering (diplomaUGPG), the answer to a recent question in Parliament revealed. A state-wise analysis of the reduction of seats shows that erstwhile Andhra Pradesh (including Telangana), Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra accounted for 80,000 of these reduced seats.These states also account for the highest number of engineering colleges.
Between 2012-13 and 201415, the number of approved seats have increased from 16.5 lakh to over 18 lakh. This is despite the fact that there is a steady decline in the number of students actually joining these courses. From 10.1 lakh in 2012-13, the student intake dropped to 9.9 lakh in 2013-14 and 9.1 lakh in 2014-15, a decrease of about a lakh.The data also shows that the student intake has gone down from 61% of approved seats in these colleges to 51% over the three years.
Census data shows that in 2011 there were 121 lakh people who had technical degrees or diploma equal to graduation or post-graduation. Of these, 16 lakh were unemployed and seeking work, while another 3.1 lakh were working as marginal workers.Overall, there were 5.7 lakh marginal workers with technical degrees. Experts attribute this phenomenon to various reasons. Unlike other graduate degrees, engineering is a job oriented course and a sustained slowdown reflects on job opportunities and hence student intake.
The increase in the seats despite a lower intake of students could be linked to the fact that many colleges apply for accreditation for both engineering as well as management courses, they point out.The approval alone doesn't guarantee student enrolment as many of these institutes lack basic infrastructure as well as good teaching staff.
Shutting down of private colleges/2017
HIGHLIGHTS
AICTE wants to close down about 800 engineering colleges across India
AICTE chairman said admissions are plunging in these institutions every year
Approximately 150 colleges are closed down voluntarily every year due to stricter AICTE rules
BENGALURU: The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) wants to close down about 800 engineering colleges across India as there are no takers for their seats, and admissions are plunging in these institutions every year, AICTE chairman Anil Dattatraya Sahasrabudhe told.
There are approximately 150 colleges which are closed down voluntarily every year due to stricter AICTE rules. According to a rule of the council, colleges that lack proper infrastructure and report less than 30% admissions for five consecutive years will have to be shut down, he pointed out. Sahasrabudhe was in Bengaluru on Friday to inaugurate the 'Green Hand' sculpture, signifying the pivotal role humankind plays in preserving and nurturing the environment, at New Horizon College of Engineering, Marthahalli.
According to its website, AICTE has approved the progressive closure of more than 410 colleges across India, from 2014-15 to 2017-18. Twenty of these institutions are in Karnataka. A maximum number of institutions was approved for closure in 2016-17. Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh have the maximum number of colleges which have sought progressive closure. Failing to survive, private engineering colleges either seek progressive closure and ultimately shut down or turn into polytechnics or science and arts colleges.
Progressive closure means the institute cannot admit students to the first year in that academic year, for which progressive closure is granted; however, the existing students will continue. He also advised engineering colleges and universities to revise and renew their syllabus, which is the major cause behind the fall in the number of admissions and quality of education they impart.
With the quality of engineering education and balance in the number of engineering students and their employability being big challenges, AICTE has introduced the plan for teachers' training."Most engineering college professors or lecturers are MTech or PhD holders. They don't usually have experience in teaching aspiring engineers. Now onwards, any engineering college lecturer joining anew will have to undergo six months of exclusive and compulsory training so that they can train future engineers better. Existing engineer lecturers have three years to undergo this training compulsorily," Sahasrabudhe said.
AICTE is also looking at making engineering students industry-ready so that they are hired on time. From this year onwards, every secondand third-year student will have to undergo internship compulsorily so that they are hired even before campus placements.
"Internship is the time when most students are observed by companies and have a fair chance of being absorbed. So it's better to be hired that way instead of depending on just five minutes of interview at campus placements. My advice to budding engineers is that they should be attentive and hardworking during internship," the chairman said.
Telangana: Over 50 colleges face closure in 2018
HIGHLIGHTS
More than 50 of the total 800 engineering colleges that will face closure in the next academic year, are from Telangana
These institutions will be barred from conducting fresh admissions to their four-year programme in 2018
HYDERABAD: More than 50 of the total 800 engineering colleges that will face closure in the next academic year, are from Telangana. As per the list of institutions released by All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE), these colleges are scattered across Khammam, Kodad, Warangal, Yacharam mandal, Narsampet and Nizamabad. These institutions will be barred from conducting fresh admissions to their four-year programme in 2018, owing to a steady decline in admission numbers over the last five years. This year too, 64 colleges from Telangana failing to admit students in their first year were shut, with the AICTE approving their applications for `progressive closure'. The existing students, however, were allowed to continue with their programme.
As per the AICTE rulebook, colleges lacking proper infrastructure and reporting less than 30% admission for five consecutive years will have to shut down during the next academic year. The other option, extended to them by the AICTE, is to merge with another nearby college.
Keeping with this norm, the colleges identified for closure this year, have now been asked to submit a report on whether they want to close down or merge with another college as the change will be effective only from 2018-19 academic year.
"It is primarily the colleges in rural areas, districts and in the outskirts of Hyderabad and Ranga Reddy that will be closed by the AICTE as they have failed to attract enough students over the past few years," said N Yadaiah, registrar, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Hyderabad. He added that this year too, of the 212 private engineering colleges only 181 have been granted affiliation.
2018: Number of seats to go down by 80,000
From: Manash Gohain, Number of engineering seats to go down by 80,000 in 2018, April 8, 2018: The Times of India
200 ‘Substandard’ Colleges Have Applied For Closure, Says AICTE
There will be around 80,000 less seats in engineering this year. This will lead to around 3.1 lakh seats less in four years, including 2018-19 academic session. Don’t get alarmed. Because actual enrolment has been on the decline since 2012-13, coming down by 1.86 lakh.
According to the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), nearly 200 ‘substandard’ engineering colleges have applied for closure. Though these colleges will not enrol new students, they will continue to function till the current batches graduate. However, for elite institutions like the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) or the National Institutes of Technology (NIT), there has been increase in intake.
Now, AICTE has also decided that by 2022, at least 50% of all the programmes in technical institutions have to get their accreditation from the National Board of Accreditation (NBA). At present, around 10% of the programmes are accredited in India.
Since 2016, the number of engineering seats has been in decline every year. According to AICTE, it is around 75,000 annually. In 2016-17, total intake capacity at undergraduate level was 15,71,220, of which total enrolment was 7,87,127, which is just around 50%. In 2015-16, total intake was 16,47,155, of which enrolment was 8,60,357, which was 52%.
“This year too there will be round 80,000 seats less. Around 200 colleges have applied for closure as they were having very low admissions in the recent past,” said Anil Sahasrabudhe, chairperson, AICTE.
The closure of the engineering colleges will, however, not impact the current batches as the colleges would continue to function till the already-enrolled students complete their courses. “The colleges will continue to function till the current batches graduate. However, these colleges will not enrol new students from this year. So, effectively, these colleges will seize to function as engineering institutions from about three-four years from now,” said Sahasrabudhe.
According to a senior HRD official, majority of the institutions which are going to face closure have less than 20% enrolment in last three years. “Many of those, in fact, recorded nil admissions. So, even the aspirants don’t prefer these institutions as they are substandard. On the other hand, IITs and NITs have increased their seats and there will be more opportunities here as the new IITs shift to their own campuses. Right now, they are functioning with 300-400 capacity,” the official said.
Employment prospects
2017: 60% graduates are unemployed
Manash Gohain, 60% of engineering grads unemployed, March 18, 2017: The Times of India
More than 60% of the eight lakh engineers graduating from technical institutions across the country every year remain unemployed, according to the All India Council for Technical Education. This is a potential loss of 20 lakh man days annually .
That's not all. Less than 1% of engineering students participate in summer internships and just 15% of engineering programmes offered by over 3,200 institutions are accredited by the National Board of Accreditation (NBA). All this points to the huge variation in standards of technical colleges in the country , a majority of which churn out graduates who are not employable.
To buck this trend, the ministry of human resource development is planning a major revamp of India's technical education. The strategy involves rolling out the single National Entrance Examination for Technical Institutions from January 2018, linking annual teacher training as a must for approval of the institution, mandatory induction training of enrolled students and annual revision of curriculum. According to a senior MHRD official, NEETI (for admission to engi neering programmes) will be the first exam to be conducted by the National Testing Service (NTS), which will be completely computerbased. “In all probability , NTS will be ready by January 2018 to conduct the NEETI as well as National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) for medical courses.The exams will be conducted multiple times in a year,“ said the official.
As per plans, the first NEETI exam is likely to be scheduled for December 2017-January 2018, followed by another one in March 2018 and the third on May 2018.
The official added that NTS will also conduct entrance test for IIT. “The paper setting will continue to be with the IITs. Only the conduct of the exams will be NTS's responsibility .“
The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), under MHRD, has also set broad targets for raising the standards of technical education, which includes immediate improvement of employability to 60% from the current 40%, and to ensure that 75% of the students get industry exposure in the form of summer internships.
And before 2022, 50% of the programmes in the technical institutions shall be accredited through NBA, and unless there is credible progress annually , institutional approval will be refused. According to the planned initiatives of the AICTE, the selection process will be based on the single entrance test by an agency authorised by MHRD and there will be a ban on conduct of such exams by any other institution or university or agency. The institutions from now on will have to make “suitable changes in the curriculum ev ery year“ and the process shall be completed in the month of December each year ahead of the coming academic year.
AICTE has asked the institutions to prepare an action plan for implementing these initiatives along with financial implications before June 2017.
Engineers in Hyderabad are “least” employable: 2017
Swathy R Iyer , Engineers from Hyderabad ‘least employable’: Study , May 7, 2017: The Times of India
HIGHLIGHTS
The study reveals that engineering students in Hyderabad are among the 'least employable' due to their poor programming abilities.
Mere 0.7% of the candidates from the city were able to write functionally and logically correct code.
Engineering graduates in Hyderabad fall far behind their counterparts from New Delhi, Mumbai and Pune, Bengaluru, Chennai and Kolkata when it comes to programming skills. This startling revelation has come to the fore through a study conducted across 500 colleges in the country. As many as 36,000 engineering students from IT-related branches participated in the study.
Conducted with the help of 'Automata' — a machine learning-based assessment of software development skills — the study has revealed that engineering students in Hyderabad are among the 'least employable' due to their poor programming abilities. The Automata National Programming Skills Report, published by employability assessment company Aspiring Minds, attributes this to the rote learning approach adopted by engineering colleges and a dearth of good teachers for programming.
"Lack of programming skills is adversely impacting the IT and data science ecosystem. We need to provide graduates with practical coding skills. The report not only looks at student's ability to write functionally correct code, but also their programming practices and algorithmic understanding. These are essential for the industry," said Varun Aggarwal, chief technology officer and co-founder of Aspiring Minds.
The report revealed that a mere 0.7% of the candidates from the city were able to write functionally and logically correct code.
According to Sujiv Nair, CEO of Telangana Academy for Skill and Knowledge (TASK), the employability rates of engineers would improve through the introduction of specific courses at the college level itself.
"The chances of getting a job are higher if the student has a professional skilling certificate as well since the content being taught in universities and colleges is not in tune with the programming skills that the industry demands," said Nair.
Establishment
1951-2008
Year of establishment;
Address;
From: “India Today” 26/6/2017
See graphic:
Engineering institutes- Establishment;
Year of establishment;
Address
Joint Entrance Examination (JEE)
2015, ’16: drop in number of applicants
The Times of India, Jan 19 2016
Yogita Rao
Number of JEE (Main) aspirants shrinks by over 1 lakh in a year
The number of engineering aspirants registering for JEE (Main) has declined for the second year in a row. It is down by almost a lakh this year compared to 50,000 last year. CBSE, which conducts the national-level joint entrance examination, received applications from 12.07 lakh aspi rants last week. In 2015, 13.04 lakh students had registered for the test.
The fall is even steeper in Maharashtra, where the registrations are down by a third over last year. The state, however, has the highest number of applicants (1.63 lakh) in the country followed by Uttar Pradesh (1.5 lakh).
JEE (Main) is the qualifying exam for admissions to centrally funded technical institutions such as NITs, IIITs and institutions in participating states. Of the total numbers of students taking JEE (Main), the top 1.5 lakh are eligible to take the JEE (Advanced) for admissions to premier IITs. This year, the IIT council has decided to shortlist two lakh candidates. The number of students taking the JEE (Main) has been falling since last year, but till 2014, the exam used to record a rise in the number of aspirants every year.
Experts attribute the fall to the waning interest in engineering and also to the variety of choices available to students in other professions in the last few years. Vijay Singh, former national co-ordinator for science Olympiads and a Raja Ramanna Fellow, said, “For the last few years, the impression that an engineering degree does not guarantee you a job has percolated down to students.
Engineering seats are going vacant dramatically in private colleges in several states. Unless they get admission in a good college, many are not keen.“ He added that fancy courses such as hotel management, law, design, maritime, on the other hand, are picking up. “Students who are keen on research in science are completing their undergraduate programme in science and are going abroad for higher studies to reputed foreign universities.“ IITBombay director Devang Khakhar agreed that students can pursue various interests.
“There are several options available in humanities too,“ added Khakhar. IIT-Kanpur director Indranil Manna, however, said that a drop by few percentage points is hardly alarming. “Many students who are serious about pursuing engineering and are motivated will definitely appear for the entrance test. But a few, who realize that engineering is not their cup of tea, will prefer to stay out,“ he said.
The drop in aspirants from Maharashtra has contributed largely to the overall drop in registrations. Maharashtra was a participating institute in JEE (Main) till higher and technical education minister, Vinod Tawde, decided to withdraw from the test this year.The state's decision to hold its own common entrance test (MHT-CET) for engineering admissions this year may be one of the important reasons for the drop.
