Thiruvananthapuram : Even as there is skepticism over the legal validity of the government decision to accept self-financing engineering college management association’s demand that 15% seats should be declared NRI quota, the management association and government representatives are confident that the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) would take a lenient approach towards the move.
The association has already submitted a draft agreement regarding the fee structure to be followed by the member colleges for the coming academic year and the seat sharing. According to the association secretary K G Madhu, the association did not foresee any impediments towards declaring 15% seats as NRI quota. “The Christian managements have already signed agreement with the government and the permission was given for filling 15% of seats under NRI quota. I don’t think the AICTE would do anything to upset the agreement regarding the NRI quota,” he said.
He said even if the AICTE has set the limit of NRI seats as 5% of the total seats, the state government could argue for changes in the norm. “The demand is quite logical as Kerala has a good number of NRIs. Last time, the AICTE took disciplinary action against a number of colleges that admitted candidates to 15% NRI quota seats without prior permission from the regulatory body. Now, the NRI quota admission would be possible only at those colleges that have got AICTE’s prior approval. AICTE is more likely to accept the government decision to set aside 15% seats under NRI category,” he said.
However, sources said the law department has objected to the demand. As per AICTE guidelines, the managements would be free to fill more seats under NRI category only if there were seats vacant after the normal allotment process.
As per the draft agreement, the management has agreed to follow the last year’s fee structure. Unlike in the past, the managements now only fix the highest fees chargeable. All member colleges would have the freedom to admit students by collecting lesser fees.
Last year, there was unified fee for all government quota seats in 57 engineering colleges.
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