Engineering admissions at a six-year high in Maharashtra
MUMBAI: Maharashtra has witnessed a massive surge in engineering admissions this year with 1,09,422 aspirants enrolling into various branches, figures from the state common entrance test (CET) cell have revealed. In 2022, the number of admissions stand at the highest in the past six years.
In addition to the popular computer science course, experts said, emerging branches of engineering such as artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and data science have pulled aspirants back to the engineering course for the academic year 2022-23.
“In the last two years All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) promoted newage courses like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and data science and many universities in the state started these courses attracting more students in engineering again,” said professor Suresh Ukarande, principal, K J Somaiya Institute of Engineering and Information Technology, Sion
Of the 41,030 seats in courses related to computer engineering (IOT, AI and data science), 39,127 seats are filled. Similarly, 6,985 of 7,515 seats allotted to courses related to AI and Data Science, AI, and ML were also filled. In fact, 68 out of 70 seats were taken for computer science in regional language.
Traditional courses like civil engineering (CE) and mechanical engineering (ME) saw more than 50% of seats go vacant this year.
While 12,229 students sought admission to ME courses as against the intake capacity of 24,819 seats, 7,271 students took admission in CE as against the intake capacity of 18,622 seats.
This year, 128,124 seats were available in 329 colleges across the state under the central admission process in the institutes
offering engineering and technology (BE/ Btech) courses, and 1,33,076 students applied for the same.
As compared to the last academic year (2021-22), 21,046 more students sought admissions this year.
The trend of students opting for engineering admissions has decreased over the past few years. During the academic year 2016-17, around 79,435 students were admitted to engineering courses. Two years ago, in the academic year 2020-21, only 68,451 students sought admissions.