No relief for Pvt Engg colleges in Telangana

HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad High Court has not granted any relief to the unaided private engineering colleges barred from EAMCET 2014 counselling for filling seats in Telangana state.

The court was expected to pronounce its order on Monday to decide the fate of these colleges, having more than a lakh engineering seats totally.

Arguments continued before Justice A Rajasheker Reddy who was hearing a batch of petitions by the managements of private engineering and pharmacy colleges challenging the action of the JNTU of Hyderabad in cancelling affiliation to them for failure to comply with the AICTE norms and rectify academic deficiencies.

The judge heard the matter as a special case, despite it being a holiday on Saturday, in view of public interest and the urgency involved in the backdrop of the Supreme Court orders that the admissions process should be completed by August 31.

The petitioner colleges termed as arbitrary the action of the JNTU in disaffiliating as many as 174 colleges on the ground of lack of basic amenities in accordance with the norms of the varsity as well as the state government.

The counsels representing these colleges urged the court to direct the authorities to include them in the web counselling as they would be put to irreparable loss otherwise. The action of the varsity in disaffiliating the colleges without giving an opportunity to them was illegal.

They further said the President of India himself admitted that the IITs of the country were also facing severe staff crunch, and the constituent colleges of the JNTU too were not having faculty in accordance with the norms.

They urged the court to direct the authorities to allow them to participate in the counselling as there was still an opportunity for the students to opt for their colleges as the options are scheduled for August 27 and 28.

On the other hand, Advocate-General K Ramakrishna Reddy, appearing for the technical education department and JNTU of Hyderabad, urged the court to dismiss the petitions of the colleges on the ground that they have failed to fulfill the norms stipulated by the AICTE and the varsity inspite of giving an undertaking.

The AG said that the varsity has disaffiliated 167 colleges and the managements of about 141 colleges have approached the Vice-Chancellor on Friday and submitted affidavits assuring that they would fulfill the norms.

The AG further said qualified faculty, staff, library, computer laboratory with power backup etc. are the basic requirements to allow a college to run and admit students.

The state government was prepared to spend about `2,500 crore during the current academic year under the Financial Assistance to the Students of Telangana (FAST) programme, but it was not prepared to give away ,pmey to colleges which failed to fulfill the basic requirement norms, he noted.

After hearing the arguments of both the parties in detail, Justice Rajasheker Reddy said he would pronounce his order soon.