Hyderabad: Five days after Andhra Pradesh held its first Eamcet, Telangana state will hold its first Eamcet on Thursday with elaborate security arrangements.

Nearly 2.4 lakh students are set to appear for the first TS Eamcet across the state in 423 examination centres. Out of these, nearly 23 per cent students are from Andhra Pradesh and other states who will have to appear for the exam in TS.

About 1.39 lakh students will appear for the engineering exam, while more than 91,000 students will vie for medical seats in the state.

Students appearing for the exam will be frisked before entering the hall. Officials said their fingerprints will also be recorded before the exam begins. No electronic gadgets will be allowed as officials want to prevent malpractices.

The first TS Eamcet will also be unique in the sense that nearly 67 per cent of the students appearing for the exam are from the reserved categories.

About 49 per cent seats are reserved for Scheduled Tribes, Scheduled Castes, Backward Classes and physically handicapped students.

The total number of seats to be available for counselling is yet to be announced. Consequently, competition among the reserved category students is also expected to increase.

“Definitely, competition among the reserved category students will increase because of the high number of students. As a result, we are expecting a net improvement in quality as we will get the cream among reserved category students,” TS Eamcet convenor and JNTU Hyderabad Registrar Prof. N.V. Ramana Rao explained. In the engineering stream this time, 37 per cent of all the applicants are from the general category while in the medical stream, it is just about 25 per cent.

While students appearing for the AP Eamcet were allowed to appear for the exam even if they were late by a few minutes, TS Eamcet Convenor made it clear that despite transport troubles, students will not be allowed into the exam halls if they are late. Alternate travel arrangements have also been made by the JNTU Hyderabad.