Andaman students agiated as Centre makes AIEEE compulsory for NITs

Port Blair, June 14 (UNI) The Union Ministry of Human Resource Development has decided that from 2008-2009 onwards, admission in the National Institute of Technology (NITs) for outside the state (non-domicile seats) would be on All India Merit Basis, giving a massive blow to the students of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

Official sources said here today that following this development, all the NITs had now shut doors for the students of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, who, till last year, used to get direct admission to the prestigious institutes, according to local merit and quota system.

Till last year, 50 per cent of the seats in the NITs were filled by domicile candidates of the state in which the NIT is situated, while the remaining 50 per cent were filled by candidates outside the state by allocating them to different states and Union Territories.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Admission Committee, NIT, Durgapur, had also written to the Assistant Secretary (Education), Andaman and Nicobar Administration, advising him to hold up all the correspondence regarding admission of students of these islands to the NITs, the sources added.

''This decision will be a great opportunity for the students who have NIT in their own state but for the others, like those of Andaman, this decision is a disaster,'' Sapan Sarkar, an angry parent in Port Blair, told UNI.

Islanders claimed that for the students of Andaman and Nicobar, admission in the NITs was ''not a favour but a right'', as the islands are situated far-away from the mainland.

''The Andaman and Nicobar Administration must fight for getting back these 46 prestigious NIT seats,'' another parent stated while talking to UNI.

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