Updated by admin on
Thursday, June 26, 2014 11:40 AM IST
Chennai:
Colleges across India are cutting down on IT seats, and are looking for permission from the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) to exchange them for seats in core engineering branches.
15 years ago, the first choice in engineering colleges was Information Technology. However, all that has changed now, as jobs up for grabs are fewer than the number of seats in engineering colleges. Colleges across the country are seeking to surrender many of the IT seats and are seeking a swap for seats in core engineering branches.
Engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu this year have 12,242 IT seats, almost a third of the 37,534 seats in electronics and communication engineering. IT seats also amount to about half of the 23,465 seats in civil engineering and 23,059 seats in electrical and electronics engineering.
Students of IT have to grapple for campus placements along with students of other departments. IT students tend to lose out as they are recruited by tech companies alone. On the other hand, students of core engineering branches have the best of both worlds in the sense that they are sought both by tech companies and other sectors.
Market demand has now tended to influence colleges to provide courses and seats in accordance with current trends.
The infotech industry which was growing at almost 30% a year upto 2008 now finds the growth rate down to 15%. The industry, which recruited 2.5 lakh candidates in 2012-13, took only 2 lakh last year.
The number of IT students failing to get jobs could rise as the country has seen a growth in new engineering colleges each year.
However, tech companies feel things are not all that bleak as made out. They feel there is no need to cut down on IT seats. While US business may have come down, there are still good conditions for job orders from Europe and Australia, they point out.
