Times of
India: Nagpur: Friday, June 21, 2019.
Despite
being a premier institution ranked among the top ten NITs, over 400 seats were
not filled up in the city-based Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology
(VNIT, erstwhile VRCE), in the last five years.
An
RTI reply disclosed that vacancies remain in both, undergraduate (UG) and
postgraduate (PG), courses. In 2017, there were 106 vacant seats and last year
the number was 94.
Students
from entire country aspire to get admission into this prestigious institution,
which was recently ranked 31st all-India by the National Institute Ranking
Framework (NIRF). Among NITs, VNIT is ranked at sixth position, and also
attracts top-notch companies during its placements drives every year.
However,
rising vacancies is certainly a cause of concern, said RTI activist Abhay
Kolarkar, who filed the queries with VNIT.
Central
Public Information Officer (CPIO) Rajendra Yerpude attributed the trend to
students migrating to other NITs and universities. “Being a government-run
institute, we try our best to fill up all seats, till the last round. But many
a times, we don’t get eligible candidates from Joint Entrance Examination
(JEE). Due to all these factors, all seats can’t be filled up.”
Yerpude,
who himself filed the reply to Kolarkar’s queries, informed that the institute
was progressing well and they had managed to place most of their students in
reputed companies like JP Morgan, C-DOT and others. In the last academic year,
the highest salary offered was Rs23.86 lakh per annum while average package was
Rs7.5 lakh per year. However, in comparison to 2016-17, even placements numbers
have dropped by nearly 100. In 2016-17, 490 were placed, which decreased to 401
in 2017-18, and 393 till April 26 this year.
“Many
of our students prefer to go for higher studies abroad while some of them apply
for jobs themselves, which aren’t reflected in our records. Sometimes, even
companies do not recruit if they don’t find suitable candidates. However, most
top performing students get decent placements while a few underperformers may
not get through. We manage to place over 70% students every year,” Yerpude, who
is also the faculty in-charge, told TOI.
On
a positive side though, the premier institution has increased seats for its
various branches due to 10% EWS quota introduced by the BJP-led NDA government.
On faculty position, though, VNIT is facing problems, with as many as 110
teachers’ posts vacant and 13 non-teaching ones. Additionally, there are large
scale vacancies in Group B and C staff, with 116 or 286 posts vacant. “New
recruitment drive would be conducted in July-August, and some of these posts
would be filled up,” Yerpude said.
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