Fewer centums in chemistry lead to fall in engineering cutoffs among top rankers

 Engineering as a stream of education continues to attract applicants. This academic year 20,999 more candidates are eligible for counselling as compared to last year, said K. Veera Raghava Rao, Commissioner of the Directorate of Technical Education, who released the merit list on Wednesday.

Similarly, there is an increase of 13.36 % more applications from government school students under the preferential reservation category. 

This year there are just 65 students with full cutoff of 200 marks, giving more candidates an opportunity to get a seat of their choice in Anna University’s departments and in some of the top rung colleges in the State. Moreover, only 471 students have got full score in chemistry as compared to 3,909 last year, resulting in the fall in cutoffs.

Of the toppers, 58 students are from state board and seven, from other boards. Last year only two students were from other boards of education. 

Also, as many as 1,250 students who are in the cutoff mark ranges of 199.50 to 195 will benefit as the number of candidates who had the same cutoff was lower this year than last year, said Aswin Ramaswamy, an independent analyst.

3 rounds of counselling

The Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions committee 2024 will hold three rounds of counselling for academic and vocational stream students for the general category and government school students under the 7.5% preferential reservation.

Candidates will have three days to fill choices, after which the committee will release the tentative allotment list. After that candidates will have two days to confirm the allotment. On the 7th day the provisional allotment for acceptance and willingness to join and for upward movement will be released. Students will get five days to join the college of their choice. On the 13th day the committee will release provisional allotment for candidates who opted for upward movement, signalling the end of the counselling round.  

In the 1^st round for general category, candidates ranked 1 to 26,654 will participate. In the 2nd round, 77,947 candidates will participate and, in the 3rd, 92,998 candidates will participate. 

The general category students include 1,12,731 boys and 87,134 girls. Three transgenders are also participating. A total of 2,112 sportspersons, 408 persons with disabilities and 1,223 wards of ex-servicemen are eligible to participate.  

Among the 7.5% preferential quota students, 15,428 are boys and 16,793 are girls. Two transgender persons are also eligible.

College details on website

On students being lured to choose lower rung colleges despite having high cutoffs, Mr. Rao said: “We will upload the pass percentage of all colleges participating in counselling once Anna University releases the data. The college names and college codes will be displayed along with their performance details. Aspirants should check the pass percentage of the colleges when they fill in choices. Candidates should double check college names with the college code and the college’s address before making their choice. Also, students tend to give only five choices for colleges whereas the system allows for unlimited choices, both in courses and colleges,” he explained.

The cutoff of toppers in the general category academic stream is 200; in the vocational stream, the highest is 199 marks. Among government school students, the highest cutoff for academic stream is 199.50 and for the vocational stream it is 199 marks.