Denial of admission to vocational stream students questioned

Coimbatore: Pursuing a course in Tamil Nadu Agriculture University (TNAU), Coimbatore, has always been a dream of G Suganya from Pachalur of Erode district.
Her Class X board exam marks were not sufficient to get first group in Class XI. She chose vocational stream with agriculture practices to try her luck on the 5% seats allocated in TNAU for students from vocational stream.
But she could not make it to the 67 seats reserved for students from vocational stream in 18 constituent colleges under TNAU, Coimbatore.She opted for engineering in a college in Chennai, but she could have fulfilled her dream of studying agriculture if seats were reserved in 28 affiliated self-financing colleges too as it was in the past.
TNAU was admitting students from vocational stream in affiliated colleges until 2019 before scrapping the practise. This has prevented students of over 300-odd government schools and many aided schools offering vocational stream with agriculture science as the main subject from joining these professional courses.
The students who have passed Class XII under vocational stream are ineligible to join self-financing affiliated colleges of TNAU, Coimbatore, as per the admission notifications released early this month.
Students from vocational stream are not eligible to join in B Sc. (Hons) Agriculture and B Sc (Hons) Horticulture courses oferedin 28 self-financing colleges of the TNAU.
Former vice-chancellor of TNAU, Coimbatore, K Ramasamy said aspirants are free to move to the court to claim admission in private affiliated colleges as the decision to restrict students from vocational stream from joining private colleges appears recent. “The only issue may be the low marks of these students in Class XII who usually come far below in the rank list. These students prefer Coimbatore and Madurai which are also preferred by bright students and they find it difficult to manage,” he said.
Coordinator of Forum for Education Development-Tamil Nadu S Moorthy said it is unfair to allot only 67 seats out of the total 1,280 seats in 18 constituent colleges for students from vocational stream. He said in the academic year 2019-2020, 140 seats were allotted to NRI quota. But only 103 students applied for it. Similarly, another 140 seats were allotted for industrial sponsorship quota. But only 96 students applied for it.
“How can candidates from the vocational stream become eligible for government colleges but not private colleges,” questioned educationist Prince Gajendra Babu. The 7.5% reservation announced for government school students in professional courses is nullified in this case as TNAU deny admission to its private affiliated colleges for students who have studied vocational stream, he said. Asked if similar reservation for students from vocational stream in private colleges can be considered, TNAU vice-chancellor N Kumar said that poor academic performance of candidates from vocational stream was a matter of concern for private colleges. “However, decisions relating to the admission is that of the state government,” he said
Speaking to TOI, agriculture minister M R K Paneerselvam assure to look into the issue and find an amicable solution.