The News Minute | December 26, 2014 | 11.05 am IST36 of the total 535 private engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu have been functioning with principals not having the mandatory PhD degree. An RTI response by Anna University revealed that principals of the 36 colleges were not following he rules prescribed by the All Indian Council for Technical Education (AICTE), reported The New Indian Express. Answering how the colleges got university affiliation in the first place, the Anna University vice chancellor M Rajaram said that a college gains affiliation based on its aggregate marks scored during inspection. According to him principals having PhDs was only one parameter, said the report. According to one AU official, one out of every 8 faculty members in an engineering college department needs to be a PhD holder. As per the AICTE norms, colleges can function only for 18 months without a regular principal, said the report.