Dr. D.N. Reddy, Vice-Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad, is a leading academician and is known for his affable and inspiring personality.

He began his academic career as a member of the faculty of Mechanical Engineering at the Osmania University Hyderabad, where he was actively engaged in Teaching, Research, Institutional building and academic administration. He has served as the Principal, University College of Engg. Osmania University, Dean Faculty of Engineering, Member Executive Council, Osmania University, Hyderabad, Head Department of Biomedical Engineering and Head, Department of Mechanical Engineering. All through his 33 years of service he has been working closely with students, teachers, colleagues and university authorities to promote academic excellence and educational partnerships. Specialized in Mechanical Engg, Dr. Reddy holds post graduation degree in Mechanical Engineering from IIT Madras and Ph.D from IIT Delhi and is a renowned name in the field of Mechanical Engineering. He is the Life Member of many professional bodies like Indian Society for Mechanical Engineers, Technical Education, Solar Energy Society of India, Institute of Plant Engineers, Indian Science Congress Association, National Society of Fluid Mechanics & Fluid Power and Fellow of Institution of Engineers. He has pioneered more than 30 workshops and conferences at national and International level. He served as a project investigator for over 15 sponsored research projects. He has published over 80 scientific papers and has guided 12 Ph.Ds.

Marching Ahead Let’s listen to what the VC Mr D. N. Reddy has to say …

As one of the longest associates with this prestigious institution, what would you have to say about JNTU with regards to EAMCET?
EAMCET engineering, medical and agriculture common entrance test has been conducted by
JNTU for the last 13 years, in this period EAMCET has truly evolved and is continuing to do so. It has seen highs and lows, faced quite a few blows, but emerged as more and more errorfree with every passing phase/year. Couple of years ago medicine and engineering was conducted separately, but now with the number turning out to be huge, they have merged it, and especially of late owing to the number of errors surfacing in the paper, we have been taking extra care to be more vigilant in the paper setting as well as executing the exam.This year there was only one mistake in the zoology paper, which created uproar, but that apart it was an error-free paper. With the concept schools, tutorials, parents and students becoming extremely vigilant and skeptic, we are taking extra care to scrutinize the paper more rigorously than before.

What are the challenges you normally encounter in this endeavor?
I wish to take people’s attention to our practical difficulties, like setting eight sets of papers for medical and engineering, finding a language expert to translate the paper into Telugu, who is aware of the nuances of the usage of the language, etc. since we are confining ourselves to the intermediate syllabus, we take the Telugu academy textbooks to do this. We need to ensure the experts involved in paper setting are not engaged in any tutorials or classes.These are the challenges that are taxing at the same time should be met efficiently. This year’s paper setting began in October 2009,and took us gruelling seven months work. With 335,000 appearing for engineering and 55,000 for medicine this year, there was a horde of other issues to be addressed too, like administration, identifying right centers,deploying almost 20,000 staff for invigilation etc.since we get two sets printed for both engineering and medicine, on the day of the exam the concerned Minister picks up the set that goes for the exam.

How would EAMCET paper be in future?
Fortunately or unfortunately technology advancements is seeing cyber-crime. We unearthed a huge racket of sleek thieves who planned to walk into the exam hall with blue tooth technology embedded in their shirt collars thus being able to crack the code easily. These students had registered themselves not to take the exam but to give away the answers to others. Since we are allowing late-fee Rs 5,000/ - and the choice of centers for late-registrations this was an easy way for them to execute their plan. Anyway the Intelligence police caught them little before the exam day. Keeping these sophisticated crimes in view, EAMCET plans to go online very soon, in a couple of years.

Though you are planning to go online, do you think the students are competent enough to face this?
We need a preparatory period of 2-3 years to prepare all the students in the rural belt, who are not tech-savvy at the moment. We also plan to conduct mock test 15 days prior to the exam for better preparedness. Government is seriously working on this proposal which will kick start soon. We are also working on the possibility of changing the timings for medical entrance, as it would be in the month of May and heat is aggressive then. We have no choice but to have it in May, as we need to schedule it only after AIEEE, JEE etc., this year the additional delay because of the Telangana agitation, which pushed forward the counseling dates too.

What about the growing ‘competitive’ spirit which is spreading its tentacles far and wide but not in the right direction? Is it not creating undue stress and a horde of negative feelings in students?
I have seen EAMCET, engineering and medicine fever grip Andhra parents more than any other state in our country. One way it is good to see the growing awareness about education, at the same time it mustn’t lead to negative and uncalled for factors like stress. Certainly if the student is willingly pursuing the stream and is prepared to go through the gruelling coaching sessions, he or she may be encouraged by parents or students but not forced into it. Very soon we may have a social organisation of a committee formed by our people who are more sensitive to the children’s priorities and start educating parents to not rub their unrealised
dreams on their children.

Scaling Heights-
When you look at these zealous and jubilant youngsters reaping the fruits of hard work and riding high on the hard-earned success, a thought flashes across one’s mind in an instant, “what inspired them to make it? Is it the ‘high’ or an adrenalin rush that triumph gives? Is it that this achievement would pave way to their long-term zeal of accomplishing something big in future? Or is that they are driven by the impetus to come out of their practical hardships  and looking for the typical financial security?

Its hard to figure out at this age, says Mr. DN Reddy VC, JNTU, who has seen any number of such students who start this way, some go a long way to become successful entrepreneurs, academicians, CEOs whilst some settle down with not-so-great careers. All they know at this tender age is to either make their dreams come true, or fulfill their parents’ innate desires.