PUNE: A total of
60,000 engineering seats in the state remained vacant after the third round of admissions, which ended on Monday.
Around 1.25 lakh seats were up for grabs, out of which about 50% were filled till Monday. The Directorate of Technical Education (DTE) has instructed institutions to conduct the fourth round of admissions till August 3 and declare the merit list on August 7.
Around 347 institutions in
Maharashtra offered seats under the centralized admission process this year.
With the pass percentage for the higher secondary certificate (HSC) exam improving this year, the institution heads expected good admissions for the engineering stream.
This year, around 1.05 lakh applications were received for the 1.25 lakh vacant seats and 64,000 seats were filled up at the end of the third round.
The meritorious students in the first two rounds grabbed the best of the institutions as well as top branches.
The joint director of technical education Dilip Nandanwar said the problem is more prominent in third-tier colleges and institutes located in the rural areas. As per the rules, for the candidates who were allotted their first preferred college, it was mandatory for them to take admission and not go for ‘betterment’.
In 2017, of the 1.38 lakh seats available in engineering colleges in the state, 56,000 seats were vacant. In 2016, of the 1.44 lakh seats, 64,625 were vacant.
Nandanwar said, “The students who spend four years completing their degree expect to get a decent job after graduation. These days, the number of jobs available are not enough and those available do not match the required degree students have achieved. This is also true for management courses. Hence, both these streams are getting a poor response.”
The education department is expecting another 5,000 to 7,000 admissions in the fourth round.
A total of 60,000 engineering seats in the state remained vacant after the third round of admissions, which ended on Monday. 
