Ahmedabad: The ongoing crisis in engineering education admissions in Gujarat, where student interest in degree engineering courses has been steadily declining. This trend has been evident among self-financed engineering colleges, many of which are now surrendering a significant portion of their management quota seats to the centralized Admission Committee for Professional Courses (ACPC).
For the 2025 admission cycle, 42 out of 139 degree engineering institutes have relinquished 11,844 of their 34,798 management quota seats, representing 34% of these seats to the ACPC. This marks a sharp increase from the previous year when 8,377 out of 28,026 seats were surrendered. The remaining 97 colleges have chosen to retain their management quota seats, though some institutions have voluntarily given up their entire quota.
The shift towards centralisation aims to promote more equitable, merit-based admissions. Under the current rules, self-financed colleges are permitted to allocate 50% of their total seats through the management quota, with the remaining seats filled via the centralised admission process. However, the difficulty in attracting students under the management quota, particularly amid a sharp decline in the interest from Class 12th science students in engineering, is prompting colleges to rely more heavily on the merit-based ACPC system.
Overall, this year, there are 72,790 total seats across 138 engineering colleges in Gujarat, with 56,722 of them being regular state quota seats. The additional 11,844 seats surrendered from the management quota now bring the total to 68,566 available for centralised admissions. This move is viewed as a strategy to address the underutilization of seats and enhance the overall quality and transparency of technical education admissions in the state.
