Engg institutes facing faculty shortage of 67 pc

New Delhi, Mar 18 (UNI) With the engineering students in India increasing every day, institutions are facing a faculty shortag to the extent of 67 per cent all over the country.

One of the recommendations of Expenditure Reform Commission (ERC) for over 1,600 engineering colleges to seek government's prior approval for appointment of their faculties has been responsible for faculties acute shortages in them all over the country, according to industry chamber Assocham.

Seeking immediate withdrawal of the ERC recommendations, the chamber has pointed out that virtually no recruitment was permitted in these institutions as Department of Personnel denied approvals to management of 1,600 engineering and technology institutions for fresh recruitments since the year 2000 onwards.

It may be mentioned here that the ERC in 2000 recommended to the Government not to permit fresh appointments of engineering faculties to not only curtail expenditure but also down size the faculties strength in state owned institutions of higher learning.

''As a result of this particular recommendation, in the last six years has caused faculties shortages to the extent of 20,000 in number. The idle capacity of faculties in aforesaid institutions should have been 30,000 against the availability factor of only 10,000 personnel,'' said Mr Dhoot.

The 1,600 institutions have the engineering institutions intake of five lakh students of every year. As per established norm of All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE ), there should be one faculty to impart education to 15 students.

It has projected that the technical education in India faces lack of competent teaching staff which has also become the major cause of frustration among the students in a large number of technical institutions.

The failure rate is alarming in many of the institutions due to inadequate and incompetent teaching staff.

It is likely that the magnitude of the intake of engineering students will go up to 15 lakh by the year 2011-12 from five lakh now, and therefore the faculties numbers would require to be enhanced.

''The practice of ad-hoc or daily wages teachers should be banned. The performance and accountability of teachers should be enforced. The appointment of teachers should be based on merit through transparent norms and the special incentives may be offered to such students who opt for the teaching career,'' said Assocham President Venugopal N Dhoot.

The chamber has also sought immediate interference of Human Resource Development Ministry for withdrawal of this particular recommendation, which in its view discouraged engineering institutions to go in for faculties recruitment.

In view of a high degree of regional imbalance in the growth of technical institutions in the country, the shortage of teachers is more acutely felt in those regions where the growth has been particularly rapid.

There is a large number of private institutions that do not attach sufficient values to the necessity of having competent teachers and are inclined to satisfy merely the numbers and not the capabilities to adequately meet the challenging requirements of the academic programmes.

The excuse for this situation is the non-availability of teachers with the prescribed qualifications. This is also becoming a reason for employing non qualified and underpaid teaching staff.

The requirements of teachers will vary considerably from region to rejoin in view of sharp differences in the number of institutions and their enrolments. Those states with a critical shortage would have to take special measures to meet the current shortfall and proposed expansion.

Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Maharsahrta, Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka, account for an intake of students 3,36,156 that is 67 per cent of the total intake of 5,97,939.

Another set of eight states namely Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Punjab, Gujarat, Haryana, Orissa and West Bengal account for an intake of 1,35,006 that is 27 per cent.

The remaining 16 states have a meager six per cent of the total intake. This is the measure of wide regional disparity amongst various states in the country.

UNI