Chennai: The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), in a bid to improve transparency had asked the self-financing colleges to upload details like infrastructure and land facilities, faculty strength, qualifications and biometric data of faculty on the Council's website so that it could extend its approval to the existing colleges.

However, with the Consortium of Self-financing Professional Arts and Science Colleges in Tamil Nadu and the Association of Management of Coimbatore Anna University Affiliated Colleges filing a petition in the Madras High Court, it had obtained a provisional stay stating that the deadline of February 28, 2010, could not be met as the process will take time.

According to an official, such a process was initiated after the Central Bureau of Investigation had arrested senior AICTE officials in corruption-related cases.

The higher officials welcomed the move and felt that it would help improve the transparency as many students complained that the faculty members were shared between the colleges sometimes.

With the AICTE subsequently extending the deadline to March 15, 2010, a self-financing college official said that the revised date was reasonable.

"There were hassles before with the deadline as February 28, since the work assigned could not be completed under such a short time span. But now, with the extended deadline, it should be easy to complete it much before March 15," said the official.

In a meeting of the consortium members held on Saturday, it was likely that they would not upload the required details immediately.

Official say that this would either mar the transparency initiative or further extension of the deadline might result in delaying the admission process.