Admission and registration to NISER is scheduled on 10th Sept. 2007 at 10 a.m. The inauguration of the academic programme of NISER will be held at 5 p.m. on 10Sept. 2007. Students have been allotted the stream of their first choice provisionally. The final allotment of streams will be done at the end of the first year based on their overall academic performance in semester I and semester II. Students will receive scholarship at the rate of Rs. 3,000/-per month.
All the students will have to register for all the courses which are to be credited by all the entrants to NISER’s 5-year integrated M.Sc. programme. The details of course descriptions are being posted in the webpage of NISER.
All the students are required to bring with them at the time of admission the originals of the following documents:
(a) Class X and Class XII Mark Sheets,
(b) Class X certificate,
(c) Caste / Tribe certificate (in case of SC/ST candidates).
In addition they should also bring four passport size photographs and two stamp size photographs and a Demand Draft for Rs. 13,000/= (Rs. 7,000/-for SC/ST students) towards payment of tuition fee, caution money and mess advance. The DD should be drawn in favour of NISER, payable at Bhubaneswar.
The selected students are required to deposit tuition fee and other charges latest by September 14, 2007 failing which they will forfeit their seat in NISER.
Hostel accommodation All the students will be provided hostel accommodation. They are expected to register for the hostel accommodation at the time of admission. Details about the availability of hostel accommodation for boys and girls will be posted on the web soon.
If things move in the right direction, the Institute of Management and Information Technology (IMIT) here, could have a new look replete with infrastructural adequacies.
Biju Patnaik University of Technology Vice- Chancellor Omkarnath Mohanty announced here on Thursday that the ailing institution would have a new campus, land for which is being scouted at Naraj, in the vicinity of the proposed second campus of the Ravenshaw University and the Law University.
However, before that the existing building of the Institute would be renovated and the classrooms spruced up for the comfort of the students. The move to renovate and modernise the institution came as students went on a strike on Thursday over the issue.
The VC also said the college, which offered three-year MCA course and MBA would be provided with 55 computers within a month, 17 of which would be available within 10 days. It presently has 25 computers, all of them outdated.
Further, only 18 of them are functional. Internet facilities would be provided at the earliest The college would also have its library refurbished and computerised. For the first time, the Government-run institution would also have a functional placement cell.
In a Writ Petition (C) No. 10836 of 2005, the Government has submitted before the High Court of Orissa that the Government is taking follow up action for implementation of the announcement made by the Prime Minister on 28.8.2006 regarding setting up of a National Institute of Science Education and Research (NISER) at Bhubaneswar under the Department of Atomic Energy and that it is proposed to start the academic session from August, 2007. Taking cognizance of this, the Orissa High Court has disposed of the Writ Petition with a direction to the Government to ensure that the NISER is established at Bhubaneswar pursuant to the decision of the Government of India.
The Department of Atomic Energy has informed that 300 acres of land has been allotted by the government of Orissa for setting up of NISER. NISER has been registered under the Societies Registration Act and infrastructural facilities are being put in place. In addition, for admission to NISER, an NISER Entrance Screening Test (NEST) followed by interview has been conducted and admission will commence on 10th September, 2007.
This was stated by the Minister of State for Human Resource Development Shri M.A.A.Fatmi in a written reply to a question raised by Ms. Pramila Bohidar and Shri B.J. Panda in Rajya Sabha today.
While it is possible that Vedanta University, may not turn out as envisioned, it is definitely not a flawed pipe dream. We now show why some of the
arguments given in the above article is flawed.
1. This article talks about $1 billion (the number $3 billion is thrown as an afterthought towards the end of the article) and how it is not a lot money. First, Vedanta University folks have talked about $3 billion, not $1 billion. The $1 billion number is the number that Mr. Agrawal has pledged to contribute; not the number he thinks the university needs. He thinks the later number to be $3 billion. If one wonders where the rest of the $2 billion is supposed to come, then there are two likely sources: (i) the tuition paid by the students and (ii) the use of the real estate in the planned city around the Vedanta University.
Next, lets look at the budget of some of the existing Indian institutions:
UGC had a budget of 2700.17 crores in 2006-07 and 3763.52 crores in 2007-08. This include funding about 20 central universities (does not include IGNOU)
What Vedanta University folks have said is that they will spend $1 billion in the initial phase (i.e. Rs 4000 crores) and $3 billion (Rs 12,000 crores) over the next 10-15 years.
Based on the estimates about Rs 4000 crores can be used to build two new IITs (1000 crore*2) + two new IISERs (500 crores*2) + two new central universities (300 crores*2) + two new IIMs (150 crores estimate) + a new National Institute of Design (100 crores estimate). The recurring cost of these would be at 2006-07 estimates would be 2 IITs (200 crores total), two IISERs (200 crores total), two central universities (200 crores), two IIMs (30 crores), an NID (12 crores) = 650 crores. That is about 650/(8000) = 8.125% of the remaining $2 billion of the Vedanta University estimate which is a fairly small percentage of interest. (The Indian market has been making much more in recent years.)
2. The article says: "No research university in the world has 100,000 students or even anything close."
As per http://www.asu.edu/enroll/news/news2.html ASU will have 90,000 students in its campuses by 2020. (Note that all its campuses are in the Phoenix metro area. It is not like the multi-campus UC system or U of Texas system.)
So Vedanta’s goal of 100,000 students around the same time is not that different.
3. Location: It seems the author does not have much idea about the location. The Vedanta University location is about 30 miles from the outer periphery (read Khurda) of Bhubaneswar metropolitan area (the capital of Orissa) . Bhubaneswar is very well connected with the rest of the country both by train ( BBSR , Khurda Rd Schedules, Puri Schedules) and by plane and it is expected to have international flights within a year or two . The Bhubaneswar metropolitan area has a current population of 1.6 million and at the rate it is growing (both in area and population) it is likely that by 2020 it will be more than 3 million and its periphery would be close to (if not completely engulfing) Vedanta University.
4. India is hungry for good higher education and people are willing to pay for it. May be the example of KIIT, Bhubaneswar (Orissa) will open the eyes of the author. KIIT was started in 1992 by three young people with an initial investment of few thousand rupees. In 15 years it has programs in multiple fields (engineering, management, medical science, Rural management, biotechnology, Social Sciences, Dentistry, Diploma, ITI, international high schoo l) and is a deemed university. The growth and revenue of ICFAI and Amity also illustrates the revenue potential. Although none of the above are research universities, Vedanta University can collect similar revenues and spend a big part of it in research.
So it is not unreasonable that Vedanta University will have enough students paying enough in tuition to sustain it. Moreover, one should not take the real estate aspect of Vedanta University lightly. With 6000 acres, there will be enough land left beyond the core university, to earn a handsome income, which can then be ploughed into Vedanta University’s research programs. Currently, Bhubaneswar is a destination for many IT companies for their development centers. It has the big 4 of India (Wipro, Infosys, TCS and Satyam), IBM and many small and medium sized IT companies. With a top-notch environment the research park around Vedanta university should be able to attract research divisions of international companies.
Bhubaneswar metropolitan area has 26 engineering colleges (at least 5 more will start operating in the coming year) , 7 existing universities, several more in the making, etc. etc. Please see the right column of https://www.orissalinks.com/to get an idea of the existing and expected educational infrastructure of greater Bhubaneswar.
The founders of this new engineering college, TempleCity Institute of Technology and Engineering, includes a founder of KIIT (not Achyuta Samanta) and a US based initial financier of KIIT who is also very well respected in the US Oriya community. At least one (not me) north American based Orissa origin professor is involved in this project. Thus I think this will turn out to be a good college.
Education worldwide on-line has a ranking of schools. None of the schools in their list are from Orissa. In recent years some name brand schools have come to Orissa. This includes Loyola school and DPS Kalinga; both in Bhubaneswar. Performance wise DAV Chandrasekharpur in Bhubaneswar has been doing very well in the CBSE class X and XII exams, but not great in IIT entrance exams.
(Thanks to Piyush Patnaik for the pointer to the ranking.)
The share of Sainik Schools in the total intake to the National Defence Academy (NDA) has steadily increased from 16.9 % in 2003 to 25.1 % in 2007. The details are given below:-
SNo.
Year
Total intake (both terms)
No. of Sainik Schools Students
%age of Sainik Schools Students
1.
2003
602
102
16.9%
2.
2004
623
125
20.0%
3.
2005
596
114
19.1%
4.
2006
667
171
25.6%
5.
2007
643
162
25.1%
This information was given by the Defence Minister Shri AK Antony in a written reply to Shri M Raja Mohan Reddy in Lok Sabha today.
