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Chennai: Engineering students protest against arrears rule

AU assures students that their demands will be sent to panel.

Chennai: More than 500 engineering students on Friday protested in front of Anna University in Guindy and several other places in Tamil Nadu against 2017 regulations alleging that the regulations are making it difficult for them to clear their arrear papers.

The officials from Anna University assured the students that their demands would be sent to the standing committee to study their demands and a decision would be made within 10 days.

The students were agitated after the number of students who cleared all subjects has come down drastically in the November 2018 semester exams. Affiliated colleges even some of the top engineering colleges said that their results were down by 15 per cent compared to the previous semester.

Hundreds of students from engineering colleges in Chennai, Kancheepuram and Tiruvallur districts protested in front of Anna University.

“We want a chance to clear our arrears in the following semester as it was with earlier regulations. The 2017 regulations give chance to the students to appear for arrear exams only in the next academic year,” a protesting student said.

Following the revaluation scam, Anna University has brought several changes in the evaluation of answer scripts and it also affected the pass percentage.

“We have more arrears now, but limited chances to clear them. The regulation would only result in accumulating the arrears and getting the degree in four years would be very difficult,” another student said.

Anna University registrar J.Kumar met the students and assured that the university would look into their demands.

“The university would send students demand to a standing committee. Any decision on the changes can be made only based on the committee's recommendation and it would take up to ten days,” he later told reporters.

The students protested in other places including Tiruchi, Kanyakumari, Nagercoil, Villupuram, Cuddalore and Erode.

Even some of the top colleges expressed concern about the semester results. “The engineering colleges with above 70 per cent results now got around 50 per cent. The results are worrying,” a top official from city-based engineering college said.

However, university officials said the students and their college managements have misunderstood the 2017 regulations which introduced the Choice Based Credit System (CBCS) in engineering colleges. “There is no arrear in the choice based credit system. It was the only reappearance. The system is students friendly and flexible. They can finish their courses without arrears by opting for minimum credits in each semester,” officials said.

Officials from the controller of examinations have ruled out any strict evaluation this time and said it was done as usual.

Professor K.Manivannan, Vice-President of the International Federation of Engineering Education Societies said the poor results and strict regulations would discourage the students from studying engineering courses.

“When the eligibility criteria for engineering courses is only 40 per cent, the pass marks in engineering is 50% of marks. Due to the strict evaluation, even the top colleges also got average results. The new regulations would limit the opportunities to clear the arrears and university should address the issue,” he urged.

Anna University Vice-Chancellor M.K. Surappa said the university will address the concerns of students after holding discussions.

“The CBCS pattern was introduced based on the instructions from All India Council for Technical Education and University Grants Commission (UGC). We will explore options like conducting a separate exam for these students after holding discussions,” he assured

( Source : Deccan Chronicle. )
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