Bhubaneswar, July 19: Professional education in the state received a jolt with only 1,875 students having locked their choices for the management programme leaving about 3,800 seats vacant. There are around 5,650 seats in 72 MBA colleges.

While there are 11 government MBA colleges in the state with 610 seats, the 61 private colleges have 5,040 seats.

The colleges offering masters in computer application (MCA) too have fared miserably in filling up their seats. Only 657 students have shown their interest in taking admission in 54 MCA colleges. Around 4,343 seats are lying vacant.

While there are 11 government MCA colleges, there are 41 private colleges offering the programme. Last year, 3,500 had fallen vacant in MBA and 2,000 seats in MCA.

“The admission this year has reached an all time low,” said Jyoti Prakash Pattjoshi, promoter of a management college. If it goes this way, many colleges will be forced to down their shutters,” he said.

The Regional College of Management had approached the state government and the All-India Council for Technical Education for closure of two of its management programmes.

The final allotment list for both the programmes will be published tomorrow. Officials fear that the numbers might go down even more, as a large number of students are likely to withdraw.

Promoters of these colleges are banking on the second counselling schedule for which the date is yet to be announced. The situation is equally grim in engineering colleges in which 27,500 seats have been left vacant.

The number of vacancies this year has gone up by 5,000 as compared to last year. Around 23,000 seats remained vacant in 2012