The fate of students who had given the entrance test for admission into various professional courses before division of Andhra Pradesh seems to be stuck in nativity row as on now. However, Supreme Court has categorically mentioned that future of students should not affect and both states will have to complete counseling process latest by August 31 for admissions into various colleges.
Initiation of Counseling Process in Andhra Pradesh
APSCHE has started counseling process but student response to it is not as expected since many are still confused about nativity certificates and fee reimbursement scheme. If we look at Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act, 2014, it is suggested in the act that education will remain common subject between both the states and the present system will continue like this for another 10 years from the date of creation of the new state.
Though the counseling process was started in Andhra Pradesh, officials declined to collect original certificates from students attending the counseling sessions and only took the photocopies since the officials themselves are not sure what decision will be taken by the government with regards to the question of nativity.
Telangana Starts its Own SCHE
Few days ago, Telangana government has created its separate State Council for Higher Education (SCHE) and has requested Supreme Court to extend the time limit for conducting the counseling sessions up to October 31 as staff division between the two states is not completed yet and at present, there is lack of employees to undertake admission process. The government is also planning to start a financial scheme of its own known as Financial Assistance for Students of Telangana, which will substitute the present fee reimbursement system.
Issue of Fee Reimbursement
It is worth mentioning here that the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister has offered to bear fifty-eight percent of the expenditure on fee reimbursement while the rest will have to be borne by Telangana government. However, Telangana Government is not in favor of such percentage division since total students in their professional colleges will hardly be about 30% of all students who had applied from both states together and in this situation by accepting Andhra Pradesh’s offer, they will have to bear another 12% in the form of additional expenditure.
Thus as we can see the creation of new state has created concerns for students who had applied for professional courses and both the governments will have to keep aside their political interests aside and work to solve the problems these students are facing presently.
