Hitting back at KCR, Naidu said he can't decide anybody's nativity. "The nativity has to be decided in accordance with the Constitution of India," said Naidu, who claimed that nearly 950,000 students in both the states are suffering.
The row has threatened to delay the admissions as the Telangana government has filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking time till October to complete the counselling, saying it lacked staff to verify the antecedents of students.
During the hearing, the Supreme Court Aug 4 observed that admissions in engineering colleges are to be completed by Aug 31 as per the original schedule. It also advised both the states not to play politics over the future of students.
The final orders are to be pronounced Aug 11.
The Andhra Pradesh State Council for Higher Education (APSCHE) July 30 issued a notification for admissions and the process began Aug 7. However, the process has not started in Telangana and the government maintained that it lacked adequate staff for verification of students' certificates.
APSCHE argues that it is the competent authority to conduct admissions in both the states in accordance with the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014, which says that existing admission process and quotas in both the states will continue for 10 years.
The Telangana government however maintains that it has the full authority to conduct admissions into colleges located in Telangana.
"Let them go ahead with the admissions in their colleges but as far as Telangana is concerned we will start the process after the Supreme Court pronounces its verdict on our petition," said Telangana Education Minister G. Jagadish Reddy.
To pre-empt any move by APSCHE, the Telangana government last week floated its own higher education council to conduct admissions.
The Telangana government also made it clear that the government will not pay the fee arrears of Andhra Pradesh students, who took admissions in Telangana during previous academic years and are currently in various stages of completion of their courses. The arrears are estimated to be Rs.1,800 crore.
The undivided state was due to pay Rs.3,000 crore towards fee arrears to managements of private professional colleges for the academic year 2013-14.
About 395,000 students had appeared in EAMCET held in the united Andhra state in May. Of them, 185,000 students passed in engineering stream and about 86,000 qualified in medicine.
