Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently boasted about introduction of engineering courses in regional languages, including Tamil, but the two colleges in the state which have received permission to start Tamil medium engineering courses are still uncertain whether they will be able to offer the courses to students from this academic year or not. Erode Sengunthar College and Rathinam Technical Campus, are the two private engineering colleges that have received permission from the All-India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) to start engineering courses in Tamil. While Erode Sengunthar has received permission for 60 seats in Mechanical Engineering, Rathinam has got it for Computer Science Engineering.
However, the problem now is that they are yet to get necessary approvals from their affiliating university, which is Anna University, to start the Tamil medium engineering courses. The approval from affiliating university is compulsory to start the new courses.The delay in receiving approval from Anna University might pose a hurdle for the two colleges in getting students for this academic year as the last date for applying into Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions (TNEA) is August 24.
As both the colleges have not received approvals from the university, they are not able to send details of the Tamil medium engineering seats to DoTE."The Directorate of Technical Education (DoTE) has asked to submit details of the seats matrix we will be surrendering in different branches and courses for single window counselling. As the last date for submission of the data is August 12 and we are yet to get approval from Anna University, we have informed DoTE about our uncertainty. We don't know what will happen," said a source from the college.
According to sources, Anna University is hesitant in granting the approval as it doesn't have sufficient study material in Tamil to provide to these colleges. Besides, they are also skeptical that seats will fall vacant as there will be few takers for the courses and will have placement issues as well." AICTE has developed software that can translate engineering syllabus into regional languages, but we don't know how much effective the tool will be," said a faculty of Anna University. When contacted, authorities of both the colleges remained tightlipped over the issue and shared that they are expecting to get the approval from Anna University by next week.
