IITs to take in 1,000 more students
NEWDELHI: The Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are likely to significantly increase their intake in the next academic year, providing at least 1,000 additional engineering aspirants with an opportunity to study in the premier establishments.
A senior human resource development (HRD) ministry official said most of these seats will be added through new IITs, such as the ones at Mandi, Hyderabad, Ropar, Jodhpur, Bhubaneshwar, Indore and Gandhinagar. Older IITs such as Delhi, Bombay and Kharagpur may also witness an increase in seats, although not significantly.
The official said as many as 1,000 IIT seats are likely to be added to the existing 10,998, now that construction work on the new campuses is going on at full swing. “From next year, we will also earmark special seats for female candidates,” he added.
As many as 121 seats were left vacant after seven rounds of counselling across 23 IITs this year, up from 96 last year. Consequently, the HRD ministry has asked IITs to consider various ways – including the option of scrapping unpopular courses – to address the situation.
While the number of vacant seats stood at 50 in 2015, it was just three the previous year.
A number of IITs hiked their intake by 400 seats this year. A new proposal for further increasing the seats will be sent soon by the senate of the new IITs to the Joint Admission Board (JAB), which will then take a decision on the matter.
A 14% hike in seats allotted to women – around 600 – was recommended during a JAB meeting this year, taking the total number to 1,440. Women currently comprise just 8% of the total student strength of 23 IITs across the country.