COMPARATIVE STUDY OF GOVERNMENT AND PRIVATE ELEMENTARY EDUCATION SYSTEM REGARDING MUSHROOMING OF TECHNICAL EDUCATION WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO ODISHA, INDIA

Abstract

Mushrooming engineering colleges in India have outpaced the number of students they can take in. At present there are nearly 14 lakh seats available in India in 3500 engineering colleges. Nearly 1, 40,000 to 1, 68,000 seats are remaining vacated which contributes approximately 10% to 12% of the seats. The absence of enough eligible students is only one part of the problem. Efforts to address it by lowering the eligibility criteria have only compounded the other, larger problem - that of quality. In a span of three years, the number of engineering colleges doubled from 1,668 in 2007-08 to 3,241 till 2010-11, and the seats from 6.5 lakh to over 14 lakh. An estimated 1 lakh seats have been added for 2011-12, with 281 new colleges approved so far. As per The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) it cannot turn down a proposal to open an engineering college, since every individual or trust has got right to open professional institute, This though doesn't seem to be an appropriate solution but still every citizen in India has to think how to come up with a new method to provide quality technical education to the society and generate quality technocrats. Odisha has got some government colleges, one private university; some deemed universities and remaining are private engineering colleges. The state of Odisha has become a part and partial to this effect with nearly more than 100 engineering colleges with approximately 40% of the seats remaining vacated. Though some of the seats are filled in the 3rd semester by lateral entries but still lot of seats are still remaining unedited. Every year 10 to 12 nos. of new engineering colleges are coming up and the situation is worsening day by day. At one point of time, private engineering colleges were being established at a rapid rate. All of a sudden this sudden mushrooming spelled doom for the educational scenario which was to affect the job market, as there was a doubt whether India could generate that many jobs for the upcoming engineers. But there are good points to this also. Like now a student can still get their degree and stay near their home. This obviously is a boon for the parents who can get to see their children at the end of the day.  But the question is do these engineering colleges have the right infrastructure to teach the students. Different students have different experience and perception of these private engineering colleges, but no definite answer has been reached, as to how good are these colleges. Just good teachers won’t do the needful, proper materials to give hands-on training is also required to improve in general. Now we can only cross our fingers and hope for the best that the students do not suffer in the long run.