Move over computer engineering, Mechanical is new trend

India is looking at a change of trend as far as the engineering discipline is concerned. The traditional practice of more students opting for computer engineering is slowly fading out and is being replaced by mechanical engineering.

An analysis of the data available with All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), the government body that is responsible for technical education in the country shows that the number of enrolments in Computer Science as a subject has been on a constant decline since the year 2012. The data also shows that enrolment of for Mechanical is going upward.

In the last four years, enrolment in Mechanical has been the highest in the academic year 2013-14 at 534199, in the same year number of students enrolled in Computer science was 323697 and the number has shown a decline in the consecutive years.

With the increase in number of enrolment, number of student intake in these two disciplines has also shown a variation. The number of intake in Mechanical courses in various colleges across the country increased by two lakh from 2012-13 to 2015-16.

Officials in the government attribute it to the global trends of reducing demand for computer science engineering graduates.

"The IT industry was booming sometime back and more and more students were pursuing computer science but now the industry is saturated. There is more supply than demand of IT professionals in the industry which is the reason that students are moving towards other fields of engineering," said a senior HRD Ministry official, associated with technical education.

"Also, one does not need to study computer science engineering to pursue IT. Everyone is studying computers. If 100 people develop a software, only three people are required to maintain it, which reduces the demand for manpower. On the contrary, Mechanical is a field where one needs subject expertise to be able to work in the field," he added.

In terms of placement also, Mechanical has shown an increase in numbers over the last four years. In the academic session 2015-16 139162 students were placed as compared to around 95000 in 2012-13.

The least popular choices among students are Chemical and Textile engineering, even as engineering as a subject continues to be the top choice for students among professional courses like Management and Pharmacy.