Jan. 5: From this year, just qualifying in Eamcet will no longer ensure a seat in engineering colleges too. Much to the 700-odd Engineering college’s chagrin, the state government has decided to make it mandatory for students to secure at least 50 per cent marks in Intermediate in Maths, Physics and Chemistry to be eligible for admission to engineering colleges.
Students from scheduled castes and scheduled tribes should get at least 40 per cent. The new norm may prove disastrous for Engineering colleges as nearly 80,000 students who qualified in Eamcet last year did not secure 50 per cent marks in Inter.
But from next year, those who do no secure 50 per cent marks will not be able to pursue Engineering courses resulting in thousands of seats remaining vacant. The requirement of 50 per cent in Intermediate was applicable only to Eamcet medical stream students in accordance with the directions of the Medical Council of India two years ago.
The new norm, that is meant to improve standards in professional education, will be incorporated in the Eamcet notification set to be issued in the first week of February.
This follows the decision of the All India Council for Technical Education to increase the qualifying marks from 35 per cent to 50 per cent in 10+2 exams to improve the standards in Engineering.