More foreign students at NITs

The approval has been given by the Council of NITs, headed by Union Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal, to promote admission of foreign students to the prestigious institutions where a substantial number of seats remain vacant for the engineering students giving first preference to Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs).

The AIEEE, which is so far conducted for engineering aspirants by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) across the country, will now be conducted online for those foreign students aspiring to take admission to engineering courses at NITs, a source in the HRD ministry said. The number of vacancies in the old and new NITs in 2010-11 was 839 and these included 706 seats vacant in the established NITs themselves, according to sources.

Students who obtained AIEEE ranks within 200 normally end up opting for the IITs as their IIT-JEE ranks were higher. The highest-ranked AIEEE student who joined NITK in 2010-11 had a 381 rank and the student opted for computer science.