Bhubaneswar, March 3: Uncertainty looms over the fate of agri-engineering students of the Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology here who are left with hardly any career prospects either in the public or private sector in the state.

These students, belonging to the College of Agricultural Engineering and Technology (CAET), argued they had limited job opportunities unlike their counterparts in other branches such as civil, mechanical, electrical and computer engineering.

This despite the fact that the intake capacity of the college had been increased from 40 to 64 in 2004 to meet the demands of the state in farm mechanisation, irrigation, soil conservation and development of rural and agriculture sectors.

The four-year BTech programme deals with the application of engineering science and technology to agricultural production and processing. CAET is the only college in the state offering this specialised course.

“In the absence of jobs, our qualification and experience is going in vain. Professionally, trained agriculture engineers, who ought to be recruited by the state to modernise its agriculture sector, are forced to take up a job in the banking or marketing fields,” rued Deepak Kumar Mishra, a student.

Earlier, students graduating from the college were being absorbed as assistant engineers in departments such as agriculture resources, water resources, lift irrigation and rural development. However, the state government stalled the recruitment process in 1995 following a court case, which was disposed of only in August 2011.

“All these years, the government did not go for any recruitment and students were forced to take up all kinds of petty jobs. However, now that the case has been sorted out, the government should understand our concerns,” said Saurav Kumar Sahoo, general secretary of the students’ union of the college.

The disgruntled students said there were 56 vacancies in the directorate of agriculture, 17 in the directorate of horticulture and 42 in the lift irrigation department and six more in the groundwater department.

The students, on Friday, had also taken out a rally demanding creation of jobs for them.

Much like the students in regular BTech courses, the agricultural engineering students are selected through an entrance exam.

“We are trained in mechanisation of agriculture and in specific areas like ploughing, harvesting and managing harvesting loss. However, the knowledge we acquire for four years has no value if we can’t get a related job. It’s high time that the government took serious note of this problem,” said another student Asabari Sahu. He said about 50 per cent of the students were girls and the current situation was very discouraging for them.

The students also demanded the restructuring of the agricultural engineering service cadre like other engineering cadres of the state. They have threatened to intensify their stir if their demands were not met within a month.