Bengaluru: In a bid to improve the quality and equity of technical education offered in the state, Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU) and nine private engineering institutions in the state have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the World Bank.
It is part of the third phase of Technical Education Quality Improvement Project (TEQIP- III), which provides a funding of Rs 7 crore and will be implemented till 2020 to enable select institutions to mentor others.
The institutes chosen for TEQIP-III are BMS College of Engineering, Dr Ambedkar Institute of Technology (both from Bengaluru), Sri Jayachamarajendra College of Engineering, The National Institute of Engineering (both from Mysuru), PES College of Engineering (Mandya), Malanad College of Engineering (Hassan), H.K.E.S's PDA College of Engineering (Kalaburagi), BVB College of Engineering (Hubballi) and Basaveshwar Engineering College (Bagalkot).
The scheme, which is being implemented in three different phases, is hosted by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development with the assistance of the World Bank.
Each phase is implemented with duration of four years with the first introduced in 2010-11 with the funding shared by the Centre and State in an 80:20 ratio.
The second phase, at the same time, saw the Centre bearing 60% of the expenditure while the state and the management concerned for the private institutions shared the rest contributing 20% each.
According to an official from the National Project Implementation Unit, the third phase will be completed by March 20 and is fully integrated with the Twelfth Five-year Plan objectives for Technical Education as a key component for improving the quality of Engineering Education in existing institutions with a special consideration for Low Income States and Special Category States (SCS) and support to strengthen few affiliated technical universities to improve their policy, academic and management practices.
