Chennai, May 4 (IANS) Tamil Nadu government, which has refused to abide by the admission norms set by the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) for engineering courses, has decided to continue its own norms formulated last year.

 
 The AICTE circular would make social justice philosophy meaningless, Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi Wednesday said in a statement.
 
 He said the state government, in order to make available engineering course to all sections of the student community, had laid down the minimum qualifying marks as 50 percent for general category, 45 percent for backward classes, 40 percent for most backward classes and 35 percent for the Scheduled Castes and the  Scheduled Tribes.
 
 A recent AICTE circular had laid down minimum eligibility for general category students at 50 percent and 45 percent for all other categories.
 
 Karunanidhi said following the AICTE norms would exclude students from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tibes, backward classes and students from rural areas.
 
 He also urged the AICTE to revoke its circular in the larger interests of the student community without citing that the education is under concurrent list of the Indian constitution.