Over 240 private technical institutes across the country had to be closed down in the past three years due to dwindling demand for seats and quality of education.
Several private institutes have come up but the demand for streams, poor infrastructure and quality of education imparted remain an area of concern, Parliament was informed last week.
In this regard, Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Smriti Irani said in a written reply that "during the last three years, 242 private institutes were ordered to be closed down by AICTE", and 31 of these during the current fiscal year.
Less demand for such institutes in rural areas due to migration of students to urban centres, less demand for certain engineering programmes and problems in filling up seats and attracting good faculty were some of the reason for their closure, she said.
During 2013-14, 115 institutes were closed down while 96 were asked to wind up in 2012-13.
Andhra Pradesh topped the list with 52 such institutes being asked to close down in 2012-13 and 53 in 2013-14.
Maharashtra came next with 28 institutes in the state being asked to shut down.
According to the HRD Ministry, as of today 184 private institutes are running in the country.
University Grants Commission (UGC) and All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) expert committees inspected 85 of them, pointing out deficiencies in infrastructure and lack of qualified faculty, the minister said.
She said AICTE has reconstituted a committee under the chairmanship of former Supreme Court Justice B N Srikrishna to prescribe guidelines to private institutes for charging tuition and other fees and admission of students in technical colleges.
