The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) is the statutory body and a national-level council for technical education, under Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development.
Entrance Tests in India
In India, there is an urgent need for a centralised application system for admissions to undergraduate engineering courses. There are standardised entrance tests for admission to Medical colleges (NEET), to Management colleges (CAT) and to Architecture colleges (NATA) as well as post-graduate Engineering courses (GATE). But under-graduate engineering students have no such facilities at this moment. Certain institutions like the IITs and CBSE have instituted entrance tests like JEE (Joint Entrance Examination — Main and Advanced) for colleges under their auspices.
It is being reported that the current HRD Minister, Mr Prakash Javadekar has called for a single entrance examination for all engineering courses across the country. The ministry is in consultation with the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and is expected to discuss about instituting common entrance test in their next meeting.
The HRD Minister has hinted at creation of a pan-India system for admissions to Engineering colleges. A National Engineering Entrance Test.
There has been a boom in private engineering colleges in recent years. The graduates from such institutes are unemployable as the quality of education is very bad. A recently published report by Aspiring Minds, the National Employability Report has revealed that 6,00,000 engineering students graduate in India every year. Their study has found that up to 80% of engineering graduates in India are unemployable. The overall quality of education has deteriorated as most of these private institutes have little infrastructure or teaching ability.
Now, the HRD ministry wants things to improve. A pan-India entrance test would allow meritorious students access to good institutes, and push bad quality institutes out of the market. This would improve the quality of education as more students would be inclined to join AICTE certified institutes.
There is also a proposal to conduct an exit test for students who pass out of engineering colleges to gauge their skill levels and employability.