Hyderabad: The Telangana state government is preparing the ground to scrap Eamcet and follow the Tamil Nadu model of giving admissions in medical and engineering courses based solely on 10+2 marks.
With the AP government also talking about scrapping Eamcet, this year’s Eamcet could probably be the last one.
The TS government’s argument is that Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s dream of common schooling and free KG-to-PG education from next year cannot be realised if Eamcet is continued, as it encourages students and parents to rush for Eamcet coaching-linked corporate colleges.
Mr Rao wants common schooling in TS following the CBSE syllabus from Class VI to XII. Currently, however, students are shifting from CBSE schools after Class X to join corporate colleges in state syllabus for Intermediate with an aim of cracking Eamcet.
While the TRS government is keen to implement both the above schemes from next year, academicians have cautioned the government that the schemes will be a big flop if exams like Eamcet are continued in TS.
“The concept of Eamcet was introduced in 1985 when seats in engineering and medical courses in undivided AP were only in hundreds while about 60,000 students used to take the exam.
Now, the number of seats has surpassed the number of students in engineering courses, though there is some shortage of medical seats.
But even this gap would be filled soon as more and more entities are coming forward to set up medical colleges. In this scenario, there is no point in conducting Eamcet.
It is benefitting only a few corporate colleges which are minting money by offering integrated Eamcet coaching with Intermediate courses,” said Prof D.N. Reddy, who is associated with conducting Eamcets since 1990s and is presently working with UGC and AICTE as a member.
Academicians opine that abolishing Eamcet would surely help bridge the gap between urban and rural students as the quality of education depends on the quality of teaching faculty.
“Students from corporate colleges, located in urban areas are blessed with a high quality tea-ching faculty, But their underprivileged counterparts cannot either avail or afford such facilities.
In spite of being at a disadvantage, rural students are still able to provide tough competition to the urban students in Inter. But they miserably fail to crack Eamcet. This move will plug that gap,” said Chukka Ramaiah, eminent academician and IIT trainer.
The CM has convened a meeting with academicians, students, parents and all other stakeholders on Jan. 27 in the city to discuss on implementing common schooling and KG to PG free education schemes; the issue of abolishing Eamcet is also on the agenda.
The idea of abolishing Eamcet was first mooted by the YSR government in 2008. “The committee suggested that the government take only Inter marks into consideration.
It recommended giving 25 per cent weightage for Inter marks initially, which had to be increased to 25 per cent every subsequent year and finally give 100 per cent weightage to Inter marks, thereby abolishing Eamcet in four years.
Though 25 per cent weightage was introduced in 2008, it continued to remain at the same level even today, seven years later, for obvious reasons," said Prof K.C. Reddy, who was associated with the committee.
It's an open secret that powerful corporate colleges’ lobby, which thrives on Eamcet coaching, had exerted pressure on subsequent governments not to abolish Eamcet.
TN had banned conducting entrance tests for admissions to professional courses after 10+2 to ensure that students from poor financial background were not at a disadvantage over their counterparts from privileged sections.
A shocking revelation over how students from underprivileged sections were adversely hit on account of Eamcet came to light when last year’s Eamcet medical results were analysed.
As many as 19,029 students had scored higher marks ranging from 500 to 600 out of total 600 marks in Inter BiPC subjects, but 14,604 failed to get Medical seats in Eamcet.
Of them, in TS region, 8,300 students had secured higher marks in Inter, but 6,309 failed in Eamcet.
