KOLKATA: More engineering aspirants are likely to realise their dream of studying in the country’s premier technology institutes this year, with the IITs readying to increase their intake by 460, taking the total number of seats to 11,032.The seats will mostly be added in the new IITs. The IITs in Bhubaneshwar, Hyderabad, Ropar, Jodhpur, Patna, Indore, Mandi and Jammu have sent proposals for an increase in intake to their respective senates and the Joint Entrance Examination Board The final increase in the number of seats for the 2017-18 academic year will be announced by the JEE board once the senates clear these proposals, which, say officials, is the most likely outcome.“This shows that these IITs have been able to improve their infrastructure and can now accommodate more students,” said Y Udaykumar, co-ordinator of the Joint Seat-Allocation Authority of the IITs and the National Institutes of Technology.However, some other IITs, such as the ones at Dharwad, Goa and Tirupati, still operate out of rented campuses and have not been able to increase their student strength. Besides, none of the older IITs has sought a hike in seats, hinting at space crunch in these institutes.There is only one possible hurdle to a hiked intake: some of the IITs are going in for scrapping some of the unpopular courses, seats of which are generally not filled up.“In a meeting on February 3, the HRD ministry gave the go-ahead for closure or suspension of some of the unpopular disciplines in order to cut down on seats going vacant,” an IIT official, who attended the meeting, said on condition of anonymity.The HRD ministry, in fact, has directed all centrally-funded technical institutes that participate in joint counselling to revise their seat strength only after a proper review of vacant seats, employment opportunities, national requirement, faculty strength and available infrastructure.“The ministry has said that new disciplines may only be introduced after carrying out market-opportunity analysis based on employability, requirement of higher education and research. Additionally, the institutes may reduce the number of seats on the basis of availability of hostel facility, lab infrastructure, classrooms, and faculty strength. The senate of each institute is likely to take a decision in this regard within March 31,” the official said.