Panel advises Education Ministry to continue ban on approving new engineering colleges: Pradhan

A government-constituted panel has recommended continuation of the moratorium on granting approvals to new engineering colleges barring a few exceptions, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on Monday.

In written response to a question in Lok Sabha, Pradhan said, "The AICTE entrusted the task of reviewing the ban or moratorium regarding opening of new engineering institutions from AY 2022-23 to a committee headed by BVR Mohan Reddy. The committee has held three meetings on October 18, November 10 and 30 and reviewed the engineering capacity, enrolment and placement data over the last three years." "In the light of low enrolments into the Engineering and Diploma programmes across the country, the committee in its interim report submitted in December, 2021 recommended to continue the moratorium on approving new engineering colleges in the country barring a few exceptions," he said.

The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) had constituted a committee in 2018 under the chairmanship of Reddy, Chairman, Board of Governors, Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad on short term and medium term perspective plan for engineering education.

The committee observed that the capacity utilisation (intake capacity vs enrolment) in undergraduate and postgraduate level was 49.8 per cent during 2017-18 and had recommended that no new capacity be approved by AICTE starting from the academic year 2020 and the creation of the new capacity can be reviewed every two years thereafter.

The committee's new recommendation has come at a time when engineering colleges in India recorded a 10-year-low in the number of seats being offered this year. Officials had cited closure of over 340 colleges between 2018-19 and 2020-21 and the ban on opening of no new colleges as the reason behind the drop.

According to data shared by the minister, the total approved intake in the AICTE-approved engineering institutions has declined from 26,95,333 in academic year 2012-13 to 23,66,728 in academic year 2021-22. The intake was 24,42,948 in 2020-21 and 25,39,682 in 2019-20.