BANGALORE: After weeks of wrangling, the State Government and managements of private professional colleges on Saturday agreed for a 55:45 seat-sharing ratio for undergraduate engineering seats. Fifty-five per cent of the seats, now in the government quota, will be available for selection at a subsidised uniform fee of Rs. 25,000 per annum.

The number of subsidised fee seats, dubbed as "free seats", will touch about 25,000 this year, up from 20,100 last year, Higher Education Minister D.H. Shankaramurthy told presspersons after a three-hour meeting with the representatives of managements. For the 45 per cent management quota seats, an upper limit of Rs. 1.25 lakh has been fixed. But the limit will not apply to the 15 per cent NRI quota seats and five per cent discretionary quota.

For the 25 per cent seats under the 45 per cent management quota, individual colleges will fix the fee based on infrastructure and other factors. Last year, of the 65 per cent seats with the Government, 20 per cent entailed a fee of Rs. 85,000, and 45 per cent a subsidised fee of Rs. 20,000. This year, the higher fee category of Rs. 85,000 has been withdrawn.

A marginal fee increase has been proposed for engineering seats in government and private aided colleges. Last year, the fee was Rs. 12,000. None of the 55 per cent seats under government quota would be available for non-Karnataka students, the Minister said.

A single entrance test for both government and management quota seats was, however, not on the agenda of the meeting.

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