CHENNAI: It's not only MBBS, even getting admission to top engineering colleges

remains tough for government school students in the state. An RTI query revealed that
only less than 5% of students admitted to the Anna University's four campuses were
from government schools.

During 2018-19 BE, BTech admissions, 148 out of 3,040 students admitted in the four
campuses were from government schools, according to the data provided by Anna
University under the RTI Act.

Even in the 2017-18 academic year, government schools students admitted to the
prestigious College of Engineering, Guindy, Madras Institute of Technology, Chromepet,
Alagappa College of Technology and School of Architecture and Planning were , more
than 5% of the total.

In March 2017 Class XII exams, of 1,049 students who scored above 1181 marks, only
five were from municipal and corporation schools. Among the 10,610 students who
scored 1,151 to 1,180 marks, only 299 were from government schools. "Most of the
government school students are studying in government quota in private engineering
colleges. Many of them hail from poor families and could not pay tuition fees in private
colleges. They are also not able to get an education loan," said J Sankar, head
coordinator, Ilayathalaimurai, a social service organisation.

The tuition fees and hostel fees in the Anna University campuses is much less than in
private engineering colleges.

"Following the Covid-19 pandemic, drop-out rate in private engineering colleges is

increasing," Shankar said, adding that the state government should give preference to
government school students in government colleges.
However, Prince Gajendrababu, general secretary of State Platform for Common School
System, said wrong policies of the state government and postgraduate teacher vacancies
in government schools have a major role in poor performance of government school
students in public exams. "The state government had a policy to admit Class X toppers
in government schools to private schools and sponsor their higher secondary education.
It allowed most of the bright students to migrate to private schools. Further, many
government schools do not have subject teachers for years together. So, students are not
able to score well in exams. Addressing these two issues will be a long term solution to
the problem," he said.