Harish Rao gives GO 97 a date
BRS’s T Harish Rao tells the Congress-run Telangana government to withdraw GO 97 by September 7 over the polytechnic–YISU plan. The government has talked up moving ITIs and polytechnics under a new skills university since 2024; it still hasn’t shown the order students are protesting.
Students are seeking the text of GO 97 as the September 7 deadline approaches.
BRS deputy leader T Harish Rao on Tuesday set a September 7 deadline for the Congress government in Telangana to withdraw GO Ms No. 97, the order at the centre of the polytechnic students’ protests. He met demonstrators at Government Polytechnic College, Masab Tank, and said he would raise the issue in the Assembly and back students on the streets if the order stands. According to that report of his visit, he opposes moving government polytechnics into the Young India Skills University (YISU) framework and wants polytechnic education kept under government control.
What the government has put on record: as far back as September 2024, it said it would “finalize modalities to bring the ITI/ATC and Polytechnic colleges under the purview of Young India Skill University.” The university exists in law — the Young India Skills University (PPP) Act, 2024 — with a state-wide remit and an industry-linked skills brief. What the government has not put on the table in this dispute is the actual GO 97 text spelling out what moves when, and for whom.
Students and staff want clarity on basics: affiliation, exams and certificates, lateral entry via ECET, fees and reimbursement, and who runs campuses while SBTET is still administering the system in 2026. A high-level committee and talking points aren’t the same as rules students can sit their exams under. The Telangana Polytechnic JAC paused its agitation after the committee was formed, but warned it will restart if GO 97 isn’t scrapped.
Harish Rao’s deadline is specific — before the Assembly opens on September 7. The Congress government is less so: it announced a shift two years ago and is yet to publish the operative order driving this one. If the plan is solid, the text should be easy to show; if it isn’t, September 7 will show that too.