Chennai, Sep 20 (IANS): Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Monday announced that the state government would take care of the expenses of all students who have been admitted to professional and other courses under the 7.5 per cent government school students quota.

In his address at a function organised at the Anna University campus to provide allotment letters to a few students who have been admitted to various programmes under the quota, he said that the counselling, tuition, and hostel fees would be borne by the state government and called upon the students to make use of the opportunity.

The government decision is expected to benefit 10,000 students who will be admitted to engineering programmes and to 350 other students who will be admitted to other professional programmes like fisheries, law, and agriculture in the current academic year.

Stalin said that the current government's period will be considered as the golden era of technical education in the state just as K. Kamaraj's rule was hailed as the golden era of school education in Tamil Nadu. He said that Kalaignar Karunanidhi's period was praised for promoting collegiate education.

"It would give me the greatest of happiness if in a few years, a person meets me in a remote village and says: 'It is because of the Government Order you issued that I got placed in a big company or that I have established a company'," he said.

School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi, Higher Education Minister K. Ponmudi, and Health Minister Ma Subramanian were also present in the programme.