Engg. college teachers urged to end stir

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, FEB. 2. Renewing his appeal to the engineering college teachers to end their boycott of examination work, the Minister of State for Higher Education, Dr. G. Parameswar, has said that the Government was as much interested as the teachers were in the early granting of the revised All India Council of Technical Education pay scales.

Speaking to presspersons today, the Minister was hopeful that he would be able to convince the teachers to lift their boycott of examination work. The leaders of the association who had met him already had said that they would discuss the explanation given by the Government at the meeting of the executive committee of the association.

Dr. Parameswar said that the Government was only awaiting the guidelines from the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development before implementing the revised AICTE pay scales. There was no delay on the part of the Government. He expected the guidelines to deal with performance appraisal, career advancement etc. The Government of India would meet 80 per cent of the cost of implementing the revised pay scales. Of the Rs.16.5 crores (a year) needed for the implementation, the State's share would be Rs. 3.3 crores. The Government was eager to utilise the Centre's assistance before the end of the financial year.

However the Minister made it clear that the State Government would not be able to extend the revised pay scales to teachers in the unaided engineering colleges. Out of the 77 engineering colleges in the State, only 16 were aided ones and the Government's willingness to grant the new pay scales would cover only the teachers in the aided institutions. The Government had no control over the teachers in the unaided colleges.

Dr. Parameswar also said that the association was putting forth demands only through the Press and had not presented a memorandum to him.

The Minister defended the recommendation of a subcommittee, of which he is a member, to the Cabinet to reconsider its decision against permitting new engineering colleges, in the case of three institutions (applications). While Karnataka had 77 engineering colleges with an intake of 24,500 students a year, Tamil Nadu had 140 colleges. Similarly Andhra Pradesh too had a large number of colleges. Of the intake fixed in the State, 5,500 were in the discipline of computer engineering, 3,500 civil and 5,000 mechanical. The Minister said that the three new colleges suggested by the Cabinet subcommittee would have only new disciplines such as computer science and not the traditional ones. There were 18 applications before the Government for opening new colleges, but only the three had received viability certificates from the AICTE.

Dr. Parameswar said that the students who were studying in a private engineering college at Malur in Kolar District, which had been ordered to be closed, had been accommodated in other colleges. The management had not been able to open a new campus at Chandapura.

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