Ranchi, July 13: Counselling for admission into engineering institutions and polytechnics offering over 7,600 degree and diploma courses will kick off from July 18.

For degree-level engineering studies, the candidates, who cleared the joint entrance examination conducted by Jharkhand Combined Entrance Competitive Examination Board (JCECEB), will get berths according to their ranks on the merit list. And this is the first time, the JCECEB has invited approximately all 35,000 examinees to take part in the counselling process, which will be held at its office from July 18 to August 8.

“Till last year, we have been inviting the students according to their ranks in different phases. But as many seats in private engineering colleges went vacant last year, we have decided to call all examinees in the first phase itself,” JCECEB officer on special duty R.K. Singh said.

Altogether 3,014 engineering seats are up for grabs. Like every year, BIT-Sindri, the lone state-owned engineering college, will be the top pick this time too.

The Dhanbad-based cradle offers 690 seats in 10 streams — chemical, civil, computer science, electrical, electronics and communication, information technology, mechanical, metallurgical, mining and production.

Some of the private engineering colleges that are an option are Vinoba Bhave University-run University College of Engineering & Technology in Hazaribagh, RVS College of Engineering & Technology,Jamshedpur; BA College of Engineering & Technology, Jamshedpur; Cambridge Institute of Technology, Ranchi; Ram Govind Institute of Technology, Koderma; RTC Institute of Technology, Ranchi and Ramchandra Chandravanshi Institute of Technology, Vishramapur (Palamau).

For those who are keen to take up courses run by polytechnics and other diploma-level programmes, there are about 4,600 seats. Counselling will take place between July 18 and August 12 at JCECEB office. However, for the hotel management and catering technology course, the venue is ISM, Pundag.

Aspiring engineers will have to carry a demand draft of Rs 10,000 (general and backward categories) and Rs 5,000 (Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe) at the time of counselling. The draft should be drawn in favour of controller of examination, J.C.E.C.E.B.

For diploma courses, the amount is Rs 2,400 (general and backward categories) and Rs 500 (Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe).