World Bank gives nod for Engineering Education Loan Pact

To enhance the quality of engineering education in the country, the World Bank has signed a contract with the government of India to facilitate USD 201.50 million as loan. This amount will be pipelined to different states for improvement of education quality.

The loan signed by the World Bank as part of the third phase of the Technical Education Quality Improvement Project (TEQIP III). The 15-20 year long project was started in 2002. 250 engineering colleges are supported by TEQIP III. These include prestigious names like BIT Mesra, NIT Surathkal, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad and College of Engineering Pune.

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According to the press release sent out by World Bank, there has been a lot of improvement in education standards by introducing autonomy, accountability, institutional and policy reforms.

The objective of the project is to strengthen the engineering education in the hilly states and north-eastern states of India. TEQIP III will also extend a helping hand to assist affiliating technical universities. This will have multiple improvements amongst all the colleges affiliated to the targeted university.

According to the analysis of the Washington-based funding agency, close to 30 lakh undergraduates and post-graduates will flourish through the project. It is also being estimated that 30% of these students will be females and 20% will be students from SC and ST communities.

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PG education, innovation and research will also gain momentum through this scheme. The pact was signed by the Joint Secretary of Finance Ministry, Raj Kumar and Country Director of the World Bank India, Junaid Ahmad.

Phase three of TEQIP will focus on providing skill training to labour market candidates and enhance the performance of under-performing institutes in India.