Karnataka clears 40 more engg. colleges

By S.K. Ramoo

BANGALORE, JAN. 6. In a reversal of its earlier stand, the Karnataka Government has adopted an ``open and liberalised'' policy relating to engineering colleges with an accent on IT- related courses.

For the first time, it has granted permission to start 40 new private colleges. It has also sought the introduction of new courses and variations of course intake in the existing colleges for 2001-02. The State has 82 engineering colleges and with the establishment of the 40 new colleges, additional seats will go up by over 8,000. And seats in the existing colleges will be up by 2,260.

Karnataka, which once had the highest number of engineering colleges has been overtaken by Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. The total intake of the colleges is 29,300 and the number of seats in the IT-related branches is around 10,000. The Government has readily responded to the demand for engineering graduates, particularly in the IT-related disciplines.

According to the Director of Technical Education, Dr. Balaveera Reddy, there was a great demand for the graduates from the domestic industry and overseas. A four-member Cabinet Committee headed by the Home Minister, Mr. Mallikarjun Kharge, on the basis of reports of an expert committee headed by Dr. Reddy and the Executive Council of the Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU), recommended the establishment of new engineering colleges.

Dr. Reddy told The Hindu that about 99 per cent of the existing engineering colleges had the prescribed infrastructure and financial wherewithal to maintain academic standards. Updating of curricula was being done once in three years and the syllabi required to be updated annually, following new developments.

He admitted that severe shortage of qualified and trained teachers had assumed grave proportions. The shortage was caused because teachers were lured by the industry. The college managements were unable to attract the best and talented who were drawn by better emoluments and enhanced perks of the industry. And very few managements offered UGC pay-scales to their faculty members.

The Indian Institute of Information Technology and the Indian Institute of Science had been approached to impart training to the teachers.

Prof. Jawahar, Director, PES Institute of Technology, said there were not enough teachers with a doctorate, to be appointed as professors in various branches. The expectations of students were high and few teachers fulfilled them. One way of tackling shortage of qualified and experienced teachers was relaxation of norms relating to them.

The industry, which was the largest beneficiary of trained technical manpower, should spare a handful of its personnel to take classes during leisure.

This could be a stop- gap arrangement till the situation improved. The VTU, the Directorate of Technical Education and the Government should put their heads together and find a solution.

The situation could go from bad to worse following the establishment of 40 new engineering colleges. The current engineering syllabi was ``highly ambitious'' and was meeting the requirements of students.

Prof. Jawahar suggested that the basics of engineering education be strengthened. Instead of having too many disciplines, they could be grouped into a few broad-based branches. Each class should have a minimum of 100 to 120 students to tackle the problem of faculty shortage.

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