AICTE focuses on new-age courses

Source:  
https://www.hindustantimes.com/mumbai-news/aicte-focuses-on-new-age-courses/story-INVMHcXpgybXCRvBAaP1dP.html

The growing vacancy in engineering colleges due to the declining demand for traditional courses has led to several rule changes in engineering institutes, including the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) introducing a blanket ban on new engineering Institutes until 2022, in January 2019. The next step is to replace traditional courses with new-age and in-demand courses, said officials from AICTE.

“We are simply following the recommendations of the Mohan Reddy committee, which not only suggested a ban on new engineering institutes but also shared suggestions on how to better the quality of education in existing engineering institutes,” said a senior AICTE official.

In addition to the ban on new institutes, additional seats in traditional engineering streams —mechanical, electrical, civil and electronics — will also not be approved.

The committee further recommended that AICTE should focus on introducing undergraduate programmes in new-age courses such as artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, machine learning, data science and analytics, cloud computing, robotics, in the existing institutes.

According to information shared by AICTE, 43.3% seats were vacant across engineering and technology institutes across the country in 2018-19, whereas the figure stood at 40.6% the year before that.

In Maharashtra, however, the scenario is worse. In 2018-19, 56% seats in engineering institutes remained vacant.

“Institutes with vacant seats should be urged to convert current capacity in traditional courses into those under the new and emerging disciplines,” states the 41-page recommendation report of the committee headed by BVR Mohan Reddy, industry expert and chairman of the IIT-Hyderabad board of governors.

The committee was set up in August 2018 and the report was released in December 2018.

City colleges have already confirmed proposals for starting some of the new courses. Thadomal Shahani Engineering College in Bandra plans to start courses in AI and data analytics from the next academic year. “These courses are in demand by employers across the world. AICTE is being helpful with colleges applying for such courses,” said Gopakumaran Thampi, principal of the institute.