VISAKHAPATNAM: Notwithstanding its image, Andhra University (AU) is unable to attract students to some of its postgraduate courses, particularly in Arts and Science streams, due to the lack of employment opportunities for these courses.The dwindling interest of the students in some of the courses has the university authorities in a spot. With the time approaching for the conduct of Andhra University Common Entrance Test (AUCET 2012) for admission into post graduate courses in the campus colleges of AndhraUniversity, Adikavi Nannayya University and Dr BR Ambedkar University, they are not sure of offering some of the courses.For example only three students took admission in MA Sanskrit course which had 20 seats last year. The university authorities tried in vain to fill all the seats. The university did not conduct an entrance for the course as only 13 students applied for the 20 seats and finally only three took admission. Nearly half of the seats in some courses offered by departments of Philosophy, Music, Anthropology, Chemistryand Geophysics, among others, have remained vacant last year. AUCET-2012 convener O Aniel Kumar said that the demand for AUCET has been falling due to lack of employment opportunities to students who completed some Arts and Science courses. In 2010, about 45,000students appeared for AUCET while the number decreased to 30,000 in2011. The officials are afraid the number of candidates appearingfor AUCET-2012 would fall further.Aniel Kumar said the university planned to introduce some new courses in Arts and Science departments keeping in the view employment opportunities but the proposal was dropped due to various reasons. “Even engineering graduates are struggling to get employment and it is no surprise that Arts and Science graduates are finding it difficultto find jobs,” he said. Majority of students are not evincing interest in studying in Arts and Science courses due to the poor employment opportunities. As there are no takers, about 80 of 350 colleges in the north coastal Andhra have stopped offering courses like BA and BCom at degree level itself. “Thus, we cannot expect many students to appear for PGadmissions,” in-charge principal of AU College of Arts and Commerce K Sree Rama Murthy said. Sources said AU is offering 26 PG courses in Arts and 46 PG courses in Science stream but there is demand for only a few courses, which assure employment soon after the completion of the course. If students continue to show interest only in a few courses, the university will have no option but to close the other courses, sources added.However, students say that lack of proper staff, infrastructure and also outdated syllabus in Arts and Sciences departments are keeping them away from taking admission into the said courses. “Most of these courses are still popular in north India as those universities provide placements. Due to lack of proper facilities and outdated syllabus, students who graduate from AU are not getting jobs as the university management is not taking interest in providing placements,” said M Eeswar Rao, an AU student.Some students pointed out that soon after graduation, students of arts and science streams are preparing for competitive examinations for recruitment into banks, railway and police departments and are trying to get into a job as early as possible as post graduation does not improve their chances of employment in these exams.
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