The Hindu : All set for professional course admissions

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, May 22, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

All set for professional course admissions

By K. Ramachandran

CHENNAI May 21. The sale of applications for engineering admissions, all set to begin on Wednesday, will signal the beginning of the massive annual exercise of enrolment for professional courses in the State.

Up for grabs are about 50,000 engineering seats (through the single-window system as per present figures), besides 1,410 MBBS, 880 dental and 1,860 B. Pharm seats in different institutions across the State.

The Anna University has announced that the applications will be available on its campus and in six `constituent' colleges. The last date for receipt of filled in applications is June 10. Counselling, proposed to be held in Chennai, Coimbatore, Tiruchi and Madurai, will commence in the third week of June.

More than 1.36 lakh candidates took the Tamil Nadu Professional Courses Entrance Examinations in April. The results of these examinations as well as of the crucial State hsigher Secondary examinations were out last week.

Tamil Nadu has 220 engineering colleges, all now affiliated to the Anna University. Of these, nine colleges are its ``constituent institutions'' — the College of Engineering, Guindy; the A.C College of Technology and the MIT-Chromepet, besides the six colleges run by the Government at Bagayam (Vellore), Karaikudi, Coimbatore, Tirunelveli, Salem and Bargur.

The first three of the constituent colleges have about 1,160 seats in 18 different branches. The rest of the six (formerly government) colleges have about 1,420 seats.

The remaining 47,000-plus seats are spread across five `aided' and 205 self-financing colleges.

For medical education, Tamil Nadu has 11 government colleges and four self-financing colleges; one government and 11 self-financing colleges offering the dental (BDS) course; two government and 34 private institutions offering the Bachelor of Pharmacy course.

About 2.66 lakh students who secured 60 per cent in the aggregate or more in the higher secondary examinations are eligible for admission to professional courses. But, administrators and teachers say, a more realistic assessment of the students' chances in getting into these courses can be made by analysing their performance in the TNPCEE.

In all, 67,202 students appeared for biology, 1,36,247 for physical sciences and 1,18,878 for mathematics. The number of students who got 50 out of a maximum of 50 marks was 11 in mathematics, 48 in physical sciences and 51 in biology. The number of candidates who scored between 45 and 50 in the three subjects was 1,316; 4,888 and 5,320 respectively.

A professor familiar with the admission patterns notes that about 25,000 students can be expected to secure marks in the 240-plus range (a total arrived at by combining the TNCPEE and qualifying examination marks in the required ratio).

This would give them a reasonable chance of getting a seat in the college and branch of their choice.

``But there are two major variables: only a small group scores very high in both the TNPCEE and Plus Two examinations - these students can join any course. But many students perform very well in one examination and not so well in the other. The combined marks may help them get a course of their choice.

With so many students getting very high marks this year, the choice is going to be difficult, as even one-tenth of a mark can make a difference. But some of the top rankers may gain admission to other institutions,'' he explains.

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