National rankings: Poor show by Andhra Pradesh, Telangana engineering colleges
Hyderabad: While 20 private engineering colleges from Tamil Nadu, 16 from Maharashtra and seven from Karnataka feature in the national rankings released by the Union ministry for human resource development on Monday, there are just four from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh which together have nearly 600 private engineering colleges.
From Telangana, Chaitanya Bharathi Institute of Technology, Gandipet, was ranked 71. In Andhra Pradesh, three institutions – KL University, Guntur (59th), Sri Ramakrishnam Raju Engineering College, Bhima-varam (73rd) and Vignan Engineering College, Guntur (88th) – found place in the list.
Prof. Papi Reddy, chairman of the Telangana State Council for Higher Education, felt that private colleges in the states were not up to the mark. He said, “Quantity has taken over quality as far as engineering education is concerned. It is time college managements gave top priority to improve things otherwise they will be shunned,” he said.
Dr M. Santhi Ramudu, president of the AP Engineering Colleges’ Association, said few colleges had applied for the MHRD rankings due to lack of awareness. He agreed, however, that the institutions in the two states were lagging behind due to different factors.
“At least 30 private colleges in both states have good infrastructure and teaching facilities on par with leading colleges in other states. A lot is left to be desired as far as thrust in research studies is concerned,” he said.
Mr Ramudu said that the government should come to the rescue of private managements by enhancing tuition fees since the existing fees of '35,000 per year was proving to be unsustainable to run institutions.
CBIT principal Dr B. Chennakeshav Rao said the AICTE had sent communications to all colleges to apply for rankings last November.
“Two months were given. We completed the formalities in January. It’s great that CBIT is the only institution from TS to have found a place in the rankings,” he said.
