50 per cent tech students fail

Hyderabad: Efforts are on to improve the quality of education and research in engineering colleges and universities but they are not yielding results.

The pass percentages in prominent engineering colleges seem to be falling every year and so is the amount of external funding.

According to official statistics for select colleges in Telangana, less than half of the students graduated to the second year of engineering from the first without failing a subject.

Alarmed by the figures the Telangana government is gearing up to tighten norms in colleges.

The Union HRD ministry is monitoring educational statistics in top colleges of every state through the National Project Implementation Unit (NPIU) under the Technical Education Quality Improvement Programme (TEQIP) Phase 2.

According to statistics, just 40.45 per cent of the students progressed from their first year of engineering to the second year.

It is pertinent to mention here that these are statistics from the top 15 colleges in the state which include the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University College of Engineering and the Osmania University College of Engineering.

This proportion has fallen from the 70.05 per cent in 2011-12 to 68.27 per cent in 2012-13 and below the halfway mark in the last academic year. It is also important to note that these colleges are being funded by the Centre and World Bank.

Even in Andhra Pradesh, the figures are similar with only 54.97 per cent of the students progressing from the first year of undergraduate engineering to the second year.

However, this proportion was 55.08 per cent in 2011-12 in AP and increased to 55.58 per cent in the following year before dropping slightly. Even the extent of revenues from external research projects and consultancies is going down dramatically.

Astounded by the figures, the Telangana government is planning to tighten norms in universities and technical colleges. “The problem is the abysmally low percentage of attendance in colleges.

Students just don't attend classes. There is definitely a problem with the quality of faculty but students not attending classes is a huge problem. Private colleges also allow this for a fee. We will study the problem,” a senior official said.