to serve the whole country for providing technical personnel required for the successive five-year plans. In view of the following aims and objectives, it was recommended that the Regional Engineering Colleges should appropriately be renamed as Central Engineering Colleges. The all-India character was to be ensured, by each college admitting students from all the other States and appointing the best available teaching staff, on an all-India basis. Two more were later established in the states of Punjab and Himachal Pradesh at Jalandhar and Hamirpur 5 respectively owing to country's growing need for quality manpower. Recent developments Ministry of Human Resource Development issued NIT status to three more colleges which are located at These were done to provide an NIT to every new state carved out of its parent state whose NIT was lost as a result of the bifurcation. The 11th 5-year Plan envisages establishing 10 more NITs, bringing the current total of NITs to 30. Thus more than one NIT per state will become a reality. Based on the request of respective state government and feasibility, future NITs shall be either converted from the existing government institutes or can be set up as brand-new (Greenfield) NIT. External links NIT Act 2007, NITs declared as Institutes of National Importance, http://nitcouncil.org.in/data/pdf/nit-acts/act2007.pdf References History of education in India