It’s affordability that will matter over merit for engineering aspirants from this year. Eamcet engineering toppers won’t be able to join the college of their choice if they can’t afford the fee there. The reason: the fees will vary from Rs 50,000 to Rs 1.5 lakh, irrespective of whether the student is in the merit quota or in the management quota. Till now, all colleges had a uniform fee of Rs 31,000 per year for merit quota Category A seats and Rs 95,000 for management quota Category B seats. While merit quota seats were filled based on merit secured in Eamcet in the counselling, the managements filled category-B seats on their own.
However, the Supreme Court had recently ruled that there could not be different fees for merit and management quota seats and had asked the government to implement college-wise “uniform fees” for both categories. The state government is, thus, forced to devise different fee structure for each college based on their audited financial statements and salaries being paid to faculty and non-teaching staff. The government is now in the process of fixing 150 types of fee structures for the 700-plus engineering colleges. Had all colleges submitted financial statements, it would have had to devise 700 different fee structures. However only 150 colleges had submitted the details.