More than 45,000 engineering seats in Tamil Nadu expected to be vacant

CHENNAI: With the tentative allotment for students in the third and final round counselling released on Sunday, the number of vacancies in the Tamil Nadu engineering colleges under the single window system is likely to be around 45,000 this year.

Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions (TNEA-2025) began on a bright note with the highest-ever enrolment of over 3.02 lakh students.

However, after the third and final round of counselling, there are more than 45,000 seats vacant in colleges across the State. Sources from the Directorate of Technical Education (DOTE) said, “In the first round of counselling, 28,896 students from the general category got the provisional allotments.”

T Purushothaman, in charge of TNEA concurred, and added that 62,289 students from the same category got provisional allotments in the second round of counselling, which includes the government school students, who availed 7.5% horizontal reservation. “In round three, 64,629 students were given tentative allocations after supplementary counselling,” he added.

Going by the data, the total number of students who participated in three rounds of counselling and received provisional (plus tentative in the third round) allotments will be around 1.55 lakh.

DoTE sources stated, “The Higher Education Department sanctioned more seats to Anna University and its affiliated colleges under the single window system this year – over 2.02 lakh seats against last year’s 1.80 lakh. Final data of students’ admission in engineering colleges this year will be released only after the supplementary counselling, which will be organised for students who passed Class 12 supplementary exams that were held from June to August 26 this year.”