More engg colleges to shut shop this year

Hyderabad: The stringent measures put in place for the affiliated colleges under the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Hyderabad, have made several managements of the engineering institutions to opt for either closure of courses or colleges in the next academic year.

According to JNTUH officials, much before the university started its current phase of inspections to grant affiliations for the next academic year, about 28 engineering colleges offering M Tech courses have expressed their option to close down 77 courses. Following this, the number of seats in M Tech courses is expected to come down by 50 per cent in the next academic year. Currently, there are about 15,000 seats for M Tech courses, they added.

Similarly, 11 managements have so far expressed their intention to shut down their colleges during the academic year of 2018-19. In addition, four more colleges have decided to close seven courses in M Pharmacy, besides, three colleges which also want to close down MCA courses.     

Similarly, one college had opted to close MBA course. Most of the colleges opting to close courses are from Ranga Reddy, Nalgonda, and Khammam. "Till the last academic year, there were about 282 active colleges functioning under the JNTUH, but only 266 applications have so far been received by the university for the renewal of affiliation," the sources said.

According to data available, the overall seat strength till the academic year 2017-18 was 87,000. The JNTUH has already started inspecting the colleges from January 15 to verify the compliance of norms related to the infrastructure, library, laboratories, faculty and the like. 

When asked, JNTUH Vice-Chancellor Prof A Venugopal Reddy said that a number of colleges granted affiliation would only be finalised after the verification process is over. “The entire process of granting affiliations would be over around the first week of May,” he said.