Advantage top rank-holders

Advantage top rank-holders

J.S. BABLU for THE HINDU

A change has been made in the seat allocation pattern for courses to the National Institutes of Technology from this year. What could it mean for students from Kerala?

As students appear for counselling at the National Institute of Technology Calicut (NIT-C) from July 4, they would notice a major change in the admissions to NITs. From this academic year, the seats reserved for students from States other than the State in which the NIT is located will be filled based on the all-India merit.

According to a clarification put up on the web site www.ccb.nic.in of the Central Counselling Board (CCB) constituted to organise centralised counselling and allocation of seats at the NITs and other participating institutes, 50 per cent of the seats will be filled from students from the State in which the particular NIT is located, while the remaining 50 per cent will be filled on an all-India basis based on the rank in the All-India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE).

There is confusion as to whether these 50 per cent seats is for students from all States other than the State in which the particular NIT is located; or whether the students of all States in the country, including the students from that particular State where the NIT is located, are eligible for counselling to these seats.

It is learnt that CCB has clarified till the time of this report going to the press that students from all States, including the students from the State where the NIT is located, are eligible for counselling to these seats. However, a clear picture will emerge only after the trial allotment of seats starts after the completion of the off-campus on-line counselling.

Impact on Kerala students

There were nearly 200 seats reserved for students who passed their Plus Two from Kerala in NITs other than NIT-C last year. But the change in admission pattern will mean that the Kerala students will now have to compete with students from all over the country to get a seat in the all-India seat category in NITs other than NIT-C.

Definitely, students from all states who have secured high ranks will benefit, but students with lower ranks who otherwise could have got the advantage of State-specific seats will lose out this time. On the positive side, however, Kerala students, provided they have higher ranks than students from other States, can get a branch of his or her choice in other NITs under the all-India seats, which they might not have got last year unless that branch was reserved for students from Kerala.

Another advantage for Kerala students, if they have higher ranks, will be that they could claim a large number of seats in NIT-C itself under the all-India seats category. (Provided CCB is going with the idea of allowing students from all states, including students from Kerala, to compete for all-India seats in NIT-C). This coupled with the 50 per cent reservation for Kerala students in NIT-C could push up the percentage of Kerala students in NIT-C to more than 50. (But an analysis of the previous years’ AIEEE rank list shows that Kerala students having higher ranks were very few compared to students from some other States.)

Another problem that may crop up in the NIT admission scenario would be that students of eight States which do not have an NIT (there are 20 NITs in 20 different States with eight States not having NITs) will not get adequate representation in NITs, unless they garner high ranks in AIEEE. Also, States having the largest number of candidates among the high ranking candidates would bag the maximum number of seats in NITs located in their States.

Courses at NIT-C

NIT-C has begun implementing the Other Backward Castes reservation as per the instructions of the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) from this academic year.

A total of 703 seats are available at NIT-C currently. The branch-wise seats for courses in NIT-C: (Number of seats reserved for students from Kerala is given in brackets.)

Civil engineering –106 seats (53); computer science and engineering –106(53); electronics and communication engineering – 106 (53); electrical and electronics engineering –106 (53); mechanical engineering – 106 (54); production engineering – 36 (18); chemical engineering – 71 (34); biotechnology – 30 (15) and B.Arch. – 36 (19).

(Information available as of now and subject to change depending on the instructions of MHRD.)

The details of courses and seat availability at NIT-C are available on the web site www.ccb.nic.in.

Counselling

The counselling consists of two phases: Off-campus on-line counselling conducted from June 23 to 29. The second phase on-campus online counselling will be conducted from July 4 to 13.

Placement

NIT-C web site says that the average salary of B.Tech. students during the placement session of 2007-08 was Rs.4.75 lakh a year and the average IT salary was Rs.5.5 lakh a year. The average salary and highest salary had grown substantially in 2007-08 compared to the previous year.