State Planning Board vice-chairman B. Vinod Kumar has urged education officials to take measures for improving the presence of Telangana students in the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs), which are government supported premier public research institutes in the country.
On the occasion of National Science Day, Mr. Vinod Kumar said that efforts should be made to increase the number of Telangana students in the IISERs as they pave way for good careers apart from serving the nation. He said that the IISER Aptitude Test for the next season will start on August 1 and officials should plan to educate children for these institutes. He wrote letters to the Education Secretary and also the Board of Intermediate Education (BIE).
Quoting some figures, he said that compared to other States, the number of students appearing and qualifying from Telangana were less. For example, last year 7,555 students appeared from Kerala scoring average marks of 48.51 out of 180 while only 644 appeared from Telangana scoring just 25.74 average marks. Other States that were doing better than Telangana include Andhra Pradesh (653 students scoring 37.75 marks), West Bengal (2,138 students scoring 51.34 marks) and Odisha (1,332 students scoring 46.32 average marks).
