Approving the proposal of science and technology department's principal secretary Ajay Kumar Thakur, the state finance department, in a communication wrote to department of economic affairs director Ravneet Kaur, said a detailed project report will be prepared after the initial proposal is recommended to the ADB.

The state finance department, in its letter to the Union government, noted that about 60,000 students from Bihar go outside the state every year to pursue technical education every year. "The state has just two engineering colleges in public sector and five engineering colleges in private sector. They have an intake of just 1,905 students per year. Similarly, the total intake for diploma awarding institutions are just 3,000," the state finance department stressed.

It has noted that the state is seeking an investment of Rs 1077.13 crore basically for upgrading the 12 polytechnics to degree level at a cost of Rs 710.55 crore, upgradating of two existing engineering colleges in Bhagalpur and Muzaffarpur at the cost of Rs 66 crore and using the remaining amount for upgrading the engineering colleges taken over at Motihari, Darbhanga and Gaya.

While drafting the proposal, the science and technology department has taken into account the increasing cost of land acquisition and the difficulty in obtaining land for establishing new technical institutes. The proposal plans to increase the intake of engineering and technical courses in Bihar to 6,410 seats.

This apart, it also visualises 1,320 seats for MCA course and another 1,020 seats for MBA course taking the total intake strength to 8,750.

The initial proposal points out that most of the existing infrastructure in Bihar is grossly underutilised. For creating an additional capacity of 8,750 seats, the department has estimated that it would require 20 new institutes which would cost Rs 3,280 crore including the cost of land. Instead, the department maintained upgrading existing technical institutions having buildings and land will cost only Rs 1077.13 crore.