SCB BDS seats increased to 50 (from 20) but lacks enough hostels: Samaja

March 23rd, 2009

Southern Railway plans a medical college attached to its hospital in Perambur

Following is  from a report in Hindu.

Southern Railway is to start a medical college with private participation by making use of the existing medical facilities available at its hospital in Perambur here.

The Chief Medical Director of Southern Railway on Friday called for expression of interest from resourceful medical institutions in the country for establishing and running the college at the cost of institutions as per the Medical Council of India regulations. The institutions should have at least 10 years’ experience in running a medical college and attached hospital as per the MCI norms. Foreign institutions can also participate in the bid, provided they comply with respective foreign medical regulatory authority norms.

Southern Railway is now running a 500-bed hospital on a 15-acre site in Perambur and the same is to be shifted soon to new premises. The existing hospital premises and the proposed new hospital complex will be available for establishing the medical college.

According to the Medical Director, the Perambur railway hospital has basic specialities in 15 disciplines and super-specialities in three disciplines.

The hospital has been recognised by the National Board of Examinations for recognition in postgraduate training. International institutions such as Royal College of Surgeons had also accredited the hospital for imparting training in PG courses.

ECOR has a central hospital in Mancheswar.  It was inaugurated in Nov 27, 2007. Following is an excerpt from the press release.

Sri K. C. Jena, Chairman, Railway Board and Ex-officio Principal Secretary, Govt. of India inaugurated the Central Hospital of East Coast Railway at Mancheswar today. The hospital which started as a Health Unit in 1982 under Mancheswar Workshop was declared to be converted to 100 bedded Central Hospital for ECoR on 09.10.2005. In the first phase, construction has been completed with 60 beds, 4 bedded ICU and OT complex with a sanctioned cost of Rs. 1.88 crores.

The second phase expansion of the Central Hospital with 40 beds with maternity and pediatric wards and 8 Nos. of Special Cabins at a cost of Rs. 1.98 crores will be taken up shortly.

This hospital which has tied up with Kalinga Hospital Ltd., Bhubaneswar, Yoshada Hospital, Secunderabad and Seven Hills Hospital, Visakhapatnam is presently catering to the medical and health care needs of almost 36000 employees of Mancheswar Workshop, East Coast Railway Headquarters, Construction Organisation, Railway Recruitment Board (RRB), Railway Electrification (RE), Railway Claims Tribunal (RCT) and retired railway employees residing at Bhubaneswar and their family members.

We should watch out how this hospital grows and may be in 5 years, ECOR could be pushed to follow the path of Southern railway and have a medical college attached to this hospital.

15 comments March 21st, 2009

NISER Construction expected to start in two months

Following is an excerpt from a report in Business Standard.

“Construction work on NISER-Bhubaneswar is expected to take off within two months and the entire campus is scheduled to be functional within four years. Once the NISER-Bhubaneswar campus is fully operational, it would have an intake of about 2,000 students which may later scale up to 4,000”, Abhaya Kumar Nayak, registrar, NISER-Bhubaneswar told Business Standard. NISER-Bhubaneswar which is currently operating out of the campus of the Institute of Physics has an intake of around 100 students. The institute is presently offering a five-year integrated MSc programme , an MSc cum Phd programme and individual Phd programmes in four basic sciences- physics chemistry, biology and mathematics.

New courses on computer sciences, earth and planetary sciences as well as engineering sciences are proposed to be introduced after the full-fledged campus of NISER-Bhubaneswar becomes operational.

NISER-Bhubaneswar would be a Centre of Excellence for teaching and research in four basic areas of science. Apart from separate academic blocks for different areas of science education and research, the NISER-Bhubaneswar campus will have planned academic and residential townships with all modern amenities and recreational facilities.

March 19th, 2009

Dr. Abhaya K. Nayak joins as NISER Registrar

Following is from a report in Pioneer.

Dr Abhaya Kumar Nayak, the former Registrar of the IIT Kanpur, joined as the Registrar of the National Institute of Science Education and Research (NISER), Bhubaneswar. He is the second permanent staff of the institute after the join of the director. The students, faculty members and staff of the institute are very happy with the new administrative head.

The first institution of its kind in the country set up by the Department of Atomic Energy, NISER, is striving to be recognised as a centre of excellence in science education and research in basic sciences.

Dr Nayak was the District Employment Officer at Rourkela, Jharsuguda and Sambalpur from 1991 to 2000. He also worked as a lecturer in economics at the Sudarsan Mahavidyalaya in Cuttack and in the Accounts Department of the Khurda Division of the SE Railway.

1 comment March 15th, 2009

IISc will admit students to its Ph.D programs with just B.Tech and without GATE/NET

(Thanks to Abi for the pointer.)

In the document here just above Section 1.7 it says:

NOTE: Candidates with BE/ B Tech/ M Sc or equivalent degree who may not have qualified in any of the above mentioned National Entrance Tests will also be considered for the Ph D program in Engineering. Short listing for interview of such candidates is based on their academic performance in the qualifying degree (upto 3^rd year in BE / B Tech, or 1^st year in M Sc), and their performance in 10^th and 12^th /PUC examinations. 

I have heard from a friend in IIT Kharagpur that this is also possible in the IITs but could not find it in the Ph.D program page of IIT Kharagpur. If one is interested they may directly contact a faculty in the apropriate IIT regarding this.

1 comment March 10th, 2009

Vedanta University Project gets Conditional CRZ (Coastal Regulation Zone) clearance: Sambada

Following is an excerpt from a report in expressbuzz.com.

State Coastal Zone Management Authority has cleared the application of Vedanta University project in its meeting held under the chairmanship of UN Behera, Secretary of State Forest and Environment Department.

… It was resolved to accord CRZ clearance while the authority imposed a number of terms and conditions before recommending it to the Centre for granting permission to take up the construction work.

The conditions include not to encroach and obstruct the natural course of the river Nuanai which is flowing through the project area. The authorities have also asked Anil Agarwal Foundation, the promoter of the project, not to undertake any construction activities in the prohibited CRZ area, discharge waste water to the nearby water bodies and it should abide by the proper solid waste management and disposal norms.

The Foundation had applied to the Ministry of Environment and Forests for necessary permission to start the work. Since the project site includes CRZ areas the Union Ministry had sent the application to the State Coastal Zone Management Authority for examination of the application.

1 comment March 6th, 2009

Forbes writes about Vedanta University in its recent issue

(Update 15th March 2009: Rediff reproduces the main Forbes article here and there are a lot of comments to that article.)

The article is at http://www.forbes.com/global/2009/0316/044_campus_politics.html. There is also a sidebar article at http://www.forbes.com/global/2009/0316/044_higher_education.html . The same issue also lists Anil Agarwal among the top 48 philanthropists and says the following:

Anil Agarwal

Country: India
Age: 55
Chairman of mining outfit Vedanta Resources.

Pledged $1 billion to build a new university in the eastern state of Orissa. Apart from arts and sciences, medicine and engineering, it plans research centers for bio- and nanotechnology, crop genetics and alternative energy. The timetable calls for the first students to arrive on campus in 2011.

Following are excerpts from the main article:

Indian mining magnate Anil Agarwal is having a tough time giving away a billion dollars. He’s pledged $1 billion to start a university along the shores of the Bay of Bengal in eastern India’s Orissa state. The grand plan for a 6,000-acre campus looks to Stanford University in California for inspiration. Leading academics would be poached from every corner of the globe. Research centers in bio- and nanotechnology, crop genetics and alternative energy would produce important work. His ultimate dream: When every building is completed and every classroom filled, 100,000 students will be enrolled, making it one of the largest universities in the world on a single campus. A more realistic goal is 10,000 students in the first eight years and double that in the next four. Ground-breaking is expected this month.

No one doubts that India needs more universities. And this would be the country’s most comprehensive, with medical, engineering and business schools all on one campus. But Agarwal’s plan is under attack on all sides. Critics say there is too much secrecy surrounding the land purchases, and they don’t understand why he needs so much land. They point to 18 villages that are in the way–7 will be displaced completely–and water supplies that will be depleted. In November a mob armed with sticks broke up a prayer service to start construction on a highway to the campus, attacked the attendees and damaged some of the construction equipment. The protests have set back the project by two and a half years. What’s more, government approvals have either already expired or been held up.

At the same time Agarwal’s company, Vedanta Resources, is under fire for its mining operation 250 miles away on the other side of Orissa. Its attempt to mine bauxite will destroy the ecology there and force out a tribal community, environmentalists claim. In January tribal members formed a 10-mile human chain in protest. Given all this, even the four academics planning the university are wary of becoming too deeply involved in the project until a clear line is drawn between the university and the company. Agarwal is in complete agreement, but the legislation to formalize that is being held up.

Agarwal, 55, built his fortune through London-listed Vedanta, which operates in India, Australia and Zambia, and mines copper, aluminum, zinc and iron ore. He owns 55% of the company and with the crash in commodity prices, he has seen his net worth plunge from $7.4 billion in November 2007 to $2.4 billion last November. He hasn’t wavered in his philanthropic commitment, though. He still says he will donate 75% of his wealth to the Anil Agarwal Foundation, and the money for the university will come from this. He’s already transferred $250 million to the foundation for the project, but won’t say how much he’s spent on the land and the other costs so far.

Agarwal’s pet cause has always been education, though he didn’t make it to college himself. He credits his father, Dwarka Prasad Agarwal, with the idea of building a university. "My father [who didn’t go to college either] reads a lot," he says. "He told me that great higher education was fundamental to where the U.S. is today. It had the vision, and it created a mass [higher] education system. Because of that it’s produced the best politicians, huge liberal arts programs, best medical research. I always felt that India should have that."

… For the brainstorming session on an engineering school, for instance, he pulled in participants from the National Science Foundation, ucla, Stanford, Princeton, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and other places. For the session on a business school, participants came from Oxford, Wharton, the Indian Institute of Management, Insead and Nanyang in Singapore. Most of them were of Indian origin.

Agarwal hired Ayers Saint Gross, a Baltimore, Maryland specialist in campus architecture, to design the university, and he wants to move ahead at full speed. But the Indian bureaucracy and the mass protests, sometimes violent, that appear whenever a big project is proposed–such as recent plans to build a Tata car plant in West Bengal and a Posco steel plant in Orissa–have slowed him down. He wanted 10,000 acres, but he had to scale that down to 6,000 and has been able to purchase only 3,900 so far. The acquisition of so much land is a lightning rod for criticism in the region. Some 18 villages will be affected and at least 450 people must be relocated, says the foundation. Agarwal, on the other hand, cites Stanford, which is spread over 8,180 acres.

… Mehta and his academic colleagues are well aware of the controversies surrounding their benefactor. "It’s crucial for the success of the university that there’s a clear separation from the company," he says. "It’s a project in its own right and not a commercial project, and it shouldn’t be used to compensate for other activities of Vedanta. That’s what makes this genuinely philanthropic: if he just hands over this grant and is not expecting any return on this."

Shah agrees. "You’ve got someone who’s genuinely putting down his own resources," he says. "To not support that because I have ideological issues that are unrelated, to me seems to be hypocritical. The history of universities is such. Duke [in the U.S.] was built with tobacco money; this university is as genuine a philanthropic project."

March 5th, 2009

Status of Deemed University applications from Orissa as of 31st Dec 2008

This status report is as off 12/31/2008 and is from here.  The earlier status report is at https://www.orissalinks.com/archives/1197.

1. Krupajal Engineering College, Pubasasan, Kausalya Ganga, Bhubaneshwar – 2, Orissa.
De-novo

F. 9-17/2007-U.3 (A) dated 15th March, 2007 withdrawn. Fresh proposal received under De-Novo No. F.9-27/2008 dt. 15.4.08

View/NOC of the State government is awaited. UGC No. F. 35-1/2007 (CPP-I).

 2. College of Engineering Bhubaneswar, Under Nabadigant Educational Trust, Plot No. 1, Sector – 3, Chandaka Nucleus Industrial
Complex, Patia, Bhubaneswar – 751 024, Orissa.
De-novo

F.9-30/2007-U.3 (A) dated 15th May, 2007

The Institute has been asked to comply with the deficiencies vide UGC Letter No. F. 35-3/2007 (CPP-I) dated 27th August, 2007

 3 Asian School of Business Management Bhubaneswar, Orissa.
De-novo

F.9-45/2007-U.3 (A) dated 18th September, 2007

Views/NOC from State Government is awaited. UGC letter No. F. 35-5/2007 (CPP-I)

 4. Vidya Bharti University, Gunupur Distt. Rayagarh, Orissa

F.9-60/2007- U.3(A) dated 28.11.2007

Views/NOC from State Government is awaited. F.35-6/2007 (CPP-I).

 5. Koustav Institute of Self Domain Patia, Bhubaneswar, Orissa.
De-novo

F. 9-68/2007- U.3(A) dated 9th January, 2008

Information has been called in checklist proforma vide UGC Letter F. 35-1/2008 (CPP-I) dt. 4.2.2008.

6. HI-TECH University Plot No. A-170, Saheed Nagar, Bhubaneswar, Orissa.

F. 9-4/2008-U.3(A) dated 15th January, 2008

Information has been called in checklist proforma vide UGC Letter F. 35-2/2008 (CPP-I) dt. 6.2.2008.

7. C.V. Raman University Bhubaneswar, Orissa.

F. 9-67/2007-U.3(A) dated 9th January, 2008

The Institute has been asked to comply with the deficiencies vide F. 35-4/2008 (CPP-I) dt. 8.8.2008.

8. Orissa Institute of Technology P.O.-Burla, Distt-Sambalpur – 758018 Orissa

F. 9-41/2008-U.3(A) dated 9th July, 2008

Institute has been requested to submit the information in the prescribed proforma & checklist vide letter No.F.35-5/2008 (CPP-I) dated 29.7.2008

2 comments March 5th, 2009

IIT Bhubaneswar plans to hire 60 faculty soon; M.Tech via video conferencing from July: Samaja

March 2nd, 2009

Last year people got into an IIT by scoring 45% in the IIT JEE

(Thanks to Jagmohan Swain for suggesting to write about this.)

See the data at https://www.orissalinks.com/archives/1303.

Aggregate Total for every 500th rank in Common Merit List

… first paper of IIT JEE 2008 consisted of 69 objective question with 246 marks. Second paper was also of same marks. So the full marks of IIT-JEE 2008 examination was 492. All questions were of objective type with negative marking. The duration of each paper was three hour.

… For OBC quota cutoff will be around 170 marks for rank 4000.

Based on the above and the open-close numbers given at https://www.orissalinks.com/archives/1303 one can see that one can get into an IIT by scoring 45% in the IIT JEE.

March 1st, 2009

IIT Bhubaneswar’s vision getting shaped

Following is an excerpt taken today from IIT Bhubaneswar’s home page. It gives some idea on what IIT Bhubaneswar is aiming for.

IIT Bhubaneswar with its 935 acres of land will be designed to have a self contained campus for 10,000 students and 1100 faculty. A Science Park will be part of this institution. The Park will house a large number of industry supported R&D units. It will promote industry relevant collaborative R&D activities with the institute and facilitate practice relevant education.

The Institute will offer education and research programmes in disciplines of national and global interest. The specific local needs will also be taken care of. To promote inter-disciplinary education and research, the Institute will not have many narrow specialization oriented departments. It will have few Schools and each School can offer several programmes.

The Foundation Stone for this IIT was laid on February 12, 2009. An estimated amount of Rs.780 crores will be spent in next few years to develope this Institute. A Master Plan for this Institute is being developed. Global tender for choice of Architect has been floated. Within next 2 years, the Institute will be operational from the new campus.

4 comments February 26th, 2009

Reviewing the visible progress of the six new IITs

The six new IITs that started classes last year are:

• IIT Bhubaneswar
  
• IIT Hyderabad
• IIT Patna
• IIT Gandhinagar
• IIT Rajasthan
• IIT Rupnagar

Here are some observations regarding visible progress with respect to these IITs.

• The first three in the above list (Bhubaneswar, Hyderabad and Patna) have their web pages under their own domain names. The other three use their mentor’s domain names.
• Among the web pages, IIT Hyderabad and IIT Patna have the most information; IIT Bhubaneswar has the least.
• IIT Patna is the only one that has already hired permanent faculty.
• IIT Hyderabad is the only one to admit Ph.D students. Since they do not have permanent faculty, it is a bit strange that they have Ph.D students. I guess either the Ph.D students will pursue their thesis with advisor from IIT Madras or they will be doing course work now and pick their advisors after permanent faculty is hired.
• IIT Hyderabad seems to be the most ready to start building their campus. IIT Bhubaneswar seems to be the next in line.
• IIT Bhubaneswar has managed the promise of most amount of land (mentioned as 891 acres in some reports; but mentioned as 935 acres in the important reports) from the state government. The other new IITs are getting the bare minimum (about 500 acres) that the central government prescribed.
• IIT Rajasthan is the only one for which even the city where it will be located is not decided.
• Among the new IITs, IIT Bhubaneswar seems to be best located in terms of the local neighborhood. It is 4 kms from the Khurda Rd station (which is 19 kms south of Bhubaneswar station), a major Railway junction, 25 kms from the existing Bhubaneswar airport and even closer (12 kms) to the location of the future Bhubaneswar airport, and is 2-3 kms from NISER (National Institute of Science Education and Research). The location parameters of the other new IITs are as follows:
  • IIT Hyderabad: 537 acres, 50 kms from Secunderabad railway station, 55 kms from Hyderabad station, 60 kms from airport; on NH-9 (Hyderabad-Pune highway).
  • IIT Patna: 500-550 acres at Amhara on Bihta-Aurangabad Rd; said to be 25 kms from heart of Patna
  • IIT Gandhinagar: 500 acres in Nasmed Village (near Thol Lake)  in Gandhinagar district
  • IIT Rupnagar : 500 acres, 42 kms from Chandigarh by road; 60 kms from Chandigarh airport; Rupnagar Railway station is on the Delhi-Ambala-Una line.
  • IIT Indore: 500 acres at Mhow, 25 km from Indore
  • IIT Mandi: 530 acres in Kamand in the Drang area; 15 kms from Mandi and around 45 kms from the Bhuntar airport.

  The older IITs are located as follows:

  • IIT Bombay: 550 acres
  • IIT Delhi: 320 acres
  • IIT Madras: 620 acres
  • IIT Kanpur: 1055 acres
  • IIT Kharagpur: (wikipedia says 2100 acres; a few other places say 1400 acres)
  • IIT Roorkee: 356 acres
  • IIT Guwahati: (most places say 705 acres; a couple of places say 785 acres)

3 comments February 15th, 2009

IIT Bhubaneswar contacts

Following is the main contact person for IIT Bhubaneswar:

Bata Kishore RAY
Registrar
IIT Bhubaneswar
Samantapuri
(Behind Hotel Swosti Plaza)
Nandan Kanan Road
BHUBANESWAR-751 013
Tel: 91-674-2301982
Fax: 91-674-2301983

Email: iitbhubaneswar@yahoo.com

Web: www.iitbbs.ac.in

Beyond the above, the other names associated with IIT Bhubaneswar are:

1. Director Designate: Prof. Madhusudan Chakrabarti
2. Mentor Director: Prof. Damodar Acharya
3. Chairperson of BOG (Board of Governors): B. Muthuraman (MD of Tata Steel)

5 comments February 12th, 2009

Foundation Stone laid for IIT Bhubaneswar

Following is from the PIB report http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=47448.

Foundation Stone of the Indian Institute of Technology ( IIT ), Bhubaneswar, was laid in Orissa today. Shri Arjun Singh, Union Minister of Human Resource Development, was to lay the Foundation Stone, but due to unavoidable reasons he couldn’t go to Orissa and the ceremony was held in his absentia at KANSAPADA ( Khudupur-Taraboi Road ) near Jatni Block Office, Khordha.

This new IIT at Bhubaneswar is part of the 8 new IITs that have been established in the country by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Ministry. Orissa is also to get a new Central University under The Central Universities Ordinance, 2009 which was promulgated by the President of India on 15.01.2009.

Following is the full text of the speech of Shri Arjun Singh, delivered on his behalf :

“ IITs are our national pride and owe their existence to the scientific temper and disposition of our First Prime Minister Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru. Making India, the knowledge hub of the world was a cherished dream of our first Prime Minister Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru. Way back in 1951, the Government of India, under the leadership of Panditji, planned to have four such institutes of excellence in the field of Engineering and Technology. The first amongst four such institutes (one for each zone) came up at Kharagpur in eastern region.

During the Eleventh Plan Period, the Government of India has decided to have eight new IITs, including IIT Bhubaneswar. IIT Bhubaneswar was one of the new IITs to become operational with 120 students in July, 2008. It is also heartening to note that the mother of the IIT system, IIT Kharagpur, is mentoring this new IIT. I would like to compliment Prof. Damodar Acharyaji, Director, IIT, Kharagpur who has made all possible efforts to mentor this IIT. The necessary facilities are being created in IIT Kharagpur Extension Campus at Bhubaneswar so that the students of IIT Bhubaneswar could have their education from Bhubaneswar itself from the forthcoming academic session starting from July 2009. IIT Bhubaneswar will offer science based engineering graduate, postgraduate and doctoral programmes of international standard in various disciplines.

The State of Orissa is a resource-rich state and we expect that IIT, Bhubaneswar will act as a catalyst for the rapid industrialization of the State. Indian Institutes of Technology are known the world over for imparting quality and relevant education to students. I am confident that this new IIT also carry forward the great tradition of IITs.

I am happy to note that the Government of Orissa has allotted 935 acres of land for this IIT. The State Government has also agreed to provide adequate facilities of water, electricity and road connectivity. I appreciate the support of the Government of Orissa to have this IIT in Bhubaneswar and would like to specially thank Shri Naveen Patnaikji for his support for the venture.

I take this opportunity to mention that we had made an assessment of various States about availability of degree and diploma level courses per lakh population in the field of technical education. We find that the availability of degree and diploma level courses per lakh population in Orissa is much below the national average. This obviously means that the regional imbalance in respect of technical education needs to be corrected. It is in this context that the setting up of an IIT in Bhubaneswar is a right and timely step. I am sure the Government of Orissa will derive maximum benefits from the Central Government schemes for educational advancement of this State.

The Government of India in its Eleventh Plan has given a major thrust to education. The Central Government has taken several initiatives in respect of new institution building. These include setting up of 30 new Central Universities, Indira Gandhi National Tribal University, eight new IITs, seven new Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), five new Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs), two new Schools of Planning & Architecture (SPAs), 10 new National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and 20 new IIITs. For this unprecedented expansion, the credit goes to the Hon’ble Prime Minister, who has been kind enough to accord very high priority to the education sector and provided a nine fold increase in the budgetary outlays for the higher education during the XIth Plan as compared to Xth Plan.

Capacity building in the diverse fields of basic science, engineering and technology, architecture, management will empower besides providing opportunities to the youth. It has been decided to launch a massive National Initiative for Skill Development under which it is proposed to give assistance for the establishment of 1000 new polytechnics. It is also proposed to upgrade infrastructure facilities of existing diploma level Government and Government aided polytechnics. In order to attract women in polytechnic education, we are proposing to provide financial assistance for the construction of women’s hostels in 500 polytechnics.

The Government is also going to incentivise the States for starting new Universities, besides giving a one time grant to the States on a matching basis to develop the infrastructure of State technical institutions. With these initiatives, we hope to increase access (by 5% GER during XI Plan) with equity and excellence.

8. I am happy to say that the State of Orissa is also getting its due share. We have decided in this Plan Period to have in Orissa State, one Central University, one National University aiming for world class standards, one IIIT, and several Polytechnics in those districts which currently do not have a Polytechnic. The Government and Private Engineering Colleges will also be getting opportunity to upgrade their facilities through TEQIP. This will provide our youth in the State with vocational and professional educational opportunities to realize their full potential.”

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KKP/ska

February 12th, 2009

Devdas babu reappointed for another term as VC of Ravenshaw University

See the news item at http://www.tathya.in/2009/story.asp?sno=2611.

1 comment February 12th, 2009

NISER Bhubaneswar is mentioned in Volume 1 of the 11th Five year plan document

In Section 8.44 (page 174) of Volume 1 (Inclusive Growth) of the 11th Five Year Plan, the following is mentioned.

The DAE has also initiated the process for establishment of the NISER at Bhubaneswar, at par with the IISER to undertake integrated five-year Masters’ courses and integrated M.Sc–Ph.D. programme in core and emerging branches of science to provide world-class education to students.

February 10th, 2009