Odisha HRD

Status of the proposed Xavier University

Following is from an article in tathay.in.

The proposed Xavier University in Odisha seems to be pushed inside the deep fridge.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik eagerly approved the proposed Xavier University in the state in July, 2009.

Thanks to the initiative of Fr.P T Joseph, Director XIMB who brought the issue to the authorities in the Odisha Government about the requirement of Xavier University in the state.

Ananga Udaya Singh Deo, Minister Planning & Coordination, who raised the issue in the State Cabinet in a strong way, impressed the Chief Minister.

With the green signal of the Chief Minister the authorities in XIMB moved ahead with accquiring land nearby the Capital City and a Detailed Plan for the proposed university was prepared.

Every thing is ready.

So every body expected that the much needed Xavier University Bill will come up in the Winter Session of the Odisha Legislative Assembly.

Now on 23 November, Winter Session of the OLA begins.

However there is no sign of the proposed bill on Xavier varsity, revealed an officer in the Department of Law.

Why is it so?

Officials in the Department of Higher Education reveal that though the Xavier University proposal has been approved by the Chief Minister, no separate bill for the proposed varsity will be presented in the Assembly.

An Umbrella Act is being prepared for all the private and professional universities, which is likely to be tabled in the House.

However legal pundits opine that such an Umbrella Act will not stand scrutiny of law.

That is why the Umbrella Act, which was posed to Department of Law during last August, is yet to be vetted by the legal experts.

Legal luminaries feel that “an Umbrella Act for Universities is bad in eyes of law”.

That is why such an Umbrella Act adopted by the Government of Chhatisgarh was set aside by the Apex Court in recent past.

Educationists feel that “If one does not have the right connections in the Corridors of Power in Odisha, it is impossible to move an inch”.

With no Godfather backing the Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB), the Director Fr. Joseph is running from pillar to post to clear the Xavier University Bill.

However no body knows where the file is gathering dust in the State Secretariat.

 

This is really unfortunate.

November 11th, 2010

Status of Operationalisation of AIIMS Like Institutes: PIB

Following is from http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=66918.

The civil work for Package I – medical college started at all the sites in last week of May, 2010 and is scheduled to be completed in 15 months except Patna where duration is 18 months. For package II – medical college, work started in the middle of September, 2010 and it is scheduled to be completed in 24 months from commencement of work. The civil work at all the six sites is at various stages.

At Rishikesh, the provision of basement for medical college has been deleted due to high water level during excavation. Consequently, structural analysis has been re-done and designs was got revised by the Design DPR consultant. At Bhubaneswar, there was resistance from local people for mobilization of activities of the contractor. As such, the work at Rishikesh and Bhubaneswar site are slightly behind the schedule.

An amount of Rs.622.37 Crore for construction of medical colleges and an amount of Rs.1330.71 Crore for hospital complex in respect of all the six sites were allocated. Mobilization advance of 5% has so far been released.

Out of 13 institutions, 10 institutions involve both civil work and procurement of medical equipment and the remaining 3 involve mainly procurement of equipment. Civil work at 4 medical colleges, viz. Trivandrum Medical College, Bangalore Medical College, Salem Medical College and Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Lucknow has been completed. The work at Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad; Jammu Medical College and OPD and Academic Block of Kolkata Medical College is likely to be completed by December, 2010 and remaining 3 institutions in 2011.

Procurement of medical equipments for all the 13 medical college is expected to be completed by March, 2011.

This information was given by Minister for Health and Family Welfare Shri Ghulam Nabi Azad in written reply to a question raised in Rajya Sabha today.

1 comment November 10th, 2010

Directors of the new IITs meet Kapil Sibal; IIT Patna and IIT Bhubaneswar receive special mention for good progress in infrastructure related development

Following is from the PIB release http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=66496.

The Union Minister for Human Resource Development, Shri Kapil Sibal had an interaction with the Directors of the eight new IITs here today. The meeting was taken to discuss issues specific to new IITs, especially with regard to the constraints they are facing in infrastructure and faculty development. All the IITs made separate presentations, consequent to which discussions were held and the following decisions were taken.

A number of IITs are facing problems of clearances with Central/State Government Departments for acquisition of the land allotted to them. In this regard, the Minister has asked for a meeting to be taken next month with the concerned State Government officials, Central Government officials and IIT Directors to facilitate the process of land acquisition. 

The issue of providing salary that will attract good faculty was discussed at length. In this regard it was decided with the Minister’s approval that topping up of government approved salary can be done by the IITs from their own funds. 

At present, in the IITs, the HAG scale(Rs.67,000-Rs.79,000) is applicable for 40% of the Professors in position. The new IITs expressed that they have been unable to implement this grade since it has been possible for them to recruit few faculty so far. The Minister stated, here, that the ministry would seek approval from the Finance Ministry/Cabinet to provide for a new proviso for the new IITs to be able to implement this salary grade. 

The new IITs felt that that a revision in fund allocation would be required in view of the escalation of construction costs. The minister directed the officials to examine the matter and come up with a proposal in this regard.   

Following is an excerpt from a report in zee news.

All the new eight Indian Institute of Technologies (IITs) established over the last three years have been asked to have their campuses ready by 2014 even as the government was mulling increasing the funds allocated for the purpose.

… IIT Patna and IIT Bhubaneswar, though, received special mention for making a good headway in infrastructure related development, they said.

Sibal also said his Ministry would move a Cabinet note on the issue of enhanced allocation of funds for campus development after the directors drew attention to cost escalation over the years.

Following is an excerpt from a report in Hindustan Times.

The human resource development ministry is planning special incentives to lure faculty from the older Indian Institutes of Technology to take up teaching posts at the country’s new breed of IITs struggling to attract teachers.

… Under the proposal for giving incentives to teachers — which the HRD ministry is currently discussing with the finance ministry — teachers at older IITs will be required to spend a ten-year tenure at one of the new-born IITs.

I don’t trust the above Hindustan Times report. I think the writer might have misunderstood something.

October 22nd, 2010

Unofficial 2010 first round open close ranks of EE and Mech of IITs, IT-BHU and ISM

The following is extracted from the unofficial source at http://piratecoders.co.cc/projects/iit-jee-results/jee-ranks/.

• The 2009 open-close ranks are here.
• The 2008 open-close ranks are here.

September 25th, 2010

Institute of Physics Bhubaneswar is one of the top research centers of India in terms of publication citations

Following is page 3 of the article at http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/10sep2010/577.pdf by K. P. Raghuraman, Romesh Chander and Giridhar Madras of Indian Institute of Science. (Thanks to Abi for the pointer.)

I confirmed from one of the authors that the highlighted institute is indeed the one from Bhubaneswar. I was also told that many their publications are the result of mega-collaborations.

The above is a great achievement for Institute of Physics. Especially since they have a small faculty of 19 and have a comparatively smaller overall budget. Kudos to them for their achievements.

September 15th, 2010

IITs get ok to have medical colleges, foreign faculty and foreign students

Update: IIT Kharagpur and IIT Hyderabad are keen on having medical schools.

Following is an excerpt from a report in Times of India.

The prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology would now offer courses in medicine with foreign nationals on permanent faculty positions and students from abroad at the post graduate level.

A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting of IIT council presided by HRD Minister Kapil Sibal on Friday.

The government decided to seek the approval of the Medical Council of India for the course, Sibal told reporters.

The IIT council meeting decided to carry out appropriate amendment in the Institute of Technologies Act to enable the IITs to offer the medicine programme, he added.

"We are making sure that wherever the instruction leads to a degree relating to any branch of medicine, then of course clearances from MCI under the Act will have to be taken," Sibal said.

He, however, said no MCI approval would be required where IITs engage with inter-disciplinary research for the advancement of learning and dissemination of knowledge not leading to a degree or qualification for the practice of medicine.

… The council also decided to enable IITs to recruit foreign faculties which should not be more than 10 per cent of the total faculty strength.

"In principle, we agreed that IITs are entitled to recruiting foreign faculties", Sibal said adding they will set up a mechanism with the Home Ministry to ensure there is no "hiccup in the process and there is easy exit and entry of people" as faculties.

Some other issues like bringing amendments to the Indian Citizenship Act will also have to be looked into, he said.

… Sibal said the meeting also agreed in principle to admit up to 25 per cent foreign students at the post graduate level on a "supernumerary basis without affecting the present admission norms for Indian students".

On medical schools at IIT, the main bone of contention was that IITs would have preferred that the medical schools in IITs do not have to get approval from the Medical Council of India. This would have been similar to them not needing approval from AICTE for their engineering programs. But the health ministry would not agree to that. So now the IITs are ready to accept MCI authority over their medical schools. This solves the problem.

4 comments September 10th, 2010

IITs ask permission to hire foreign faculty in permanent positions

Following is an excerpt from a report in Times of India.

Facing a massive shortage of well-qualified teachers, the prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) have mooted a proposal for hiring foreign nationals as permanent faculty members.

With one-third teaching positions lying vacant, the proposal as a solution to meet the unprecedented staff crunch is expected to be deliberated at the next IIT council meeting on Friday, IIT officials said.

The move, if accepted, would enable the premier engineering and technology institutes to appoint foreign teachers on permanent positions, up to 10 per cent of the faculty strength.

I hope this proposal by the IITs is approved and the limit is increased from the proposed 10%.

Most universities in US, Europe, Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore etc. are able to hire foreign faculty in permanent positions. The inability of IITs and other Indian institutions to do that hurts them. This will also serve as an experiment to see how attractive the salary offered by the IITs is to foreign faculty that are not of Indian origin. The data and experience gathered from this experiment will be useful for the universities of innovation which are supposed to be unconstrained by the government in terms of salary offered to its faculty. The concept note of these universities already talked about allowing hiring of foreign faculty.

September 9th, 2010

New university and institute related acts recently passed, introduced or to be introduced in the parliament

The following were obtained from various sources. I don’t vouch for their 100% correctness. Please use them at your own risk.

• Bill to amend the NIT act; it adds IIISERs to them: introduced in the parliament but not passed yet
  • Original NIT act.
• Bil to amend the IT act for IITs; it adds the new IITs and designates IT BHU to be an IIT called IIT (Banaras Hindu University), Varanasi: introduced in the parliament but not passed yet.
  • Current IT act (incorporates past amendments)
• Nalanda University act.
• South Asian University act.
  • Intergovernmental agreement that preceded the act.
• Central Universities Act (for the 16 new central universities)
• Draft bill for the Universities of Innovation; newspaper reports mention that some changes will be made before it is introduced in the parliament.

1 comment September 2nd, 2010

Consulting Engineering Services designing AIIMS-like institute, IIT, and NISER Bhubaneswar

Their web page is http://www.cesinter.com/. From the flash presentation I got the following pictures.

In the above picture they wrote Bhubaneswar by mistake instead of Thiruvanthapuram. They are also the architect for IISER Thiruvanthapuram.

The correct picture for NISER Bhubaneswar is the following obtained from http://www.cesinter.com/arch_home/arc_proj32.asp?x=Architecture&y=Showcase%20Projects.

One may compare the design with the picture of NISER building plan pictures. They match.

Note that in http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100715/jsp/orissa/story_12682813.jsp it is mentioned that this company has also been hired for IIT Bhubaneswar. 

August 27th, 2010

IIT Bhubaneswar plans to excel in product design and creation; plans to set-up laboratories such as Materials and Tomography

Following is an excerpt from a report in Hindu:

… IIT-Bhubaneswar director Madhusudan Chakroborty said “besides setting up state-of-the-art laboratories, students are being encouraged to involve themselves in product design competition.”

While student whose design would be adjudged as the best would get Rs. 10,000 prize, second best design would get Rs.7,000, Professor Chakraborty said. In fact top 10 designs will be provided fabrication support for shaping the product, he said.

“We want IIT-Bhubaneswar to excel in product design and creation especially in auto and manufacturing sector,” the director said.

The institute is now working on multi-million pound plans to set-up laboratories such as Materials and Tomography. It may also think of procuring rapid prototyping, which is used for automatic construction of physical objects using additive manufacturing technology. Rapid prototyping is needed for the unique materials and tomography laboratory, which is being dubbed as unique.

Prof. Chakraborty, who just spent a month at Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG) of United Kingdom-based Warwick University working with its technology specialists, said the institute was looking at a long-term collaboration with the university.

… IIT, Bhubaneswar director said the institute is trying to establish long-term tie-up with industries which could work with its students in institute’s facility centre.

The institute proposed to set up a school of design and creative arts, besides their main focus on environment and climate science which is an important issue for the region often battered by natural disasters, Mr. Chakraborty said.

… The institute has been provided with 936 acres of land near Jatni, on the outskirts of Bhubaneswar. Contour survey of the land has been completed while master plan for construction is ready. The construction would start in December 2010.

See also:

• News from Warwick.
• Telegraph.

  • WMG, University of Warwick will help IIT-Bhubaneswar set up high-end research laboratories on its main campus. IIT-Kharagpur, the mentoring institute of IIT-Bhubaneswar, recently entered into a joint venture with the university in this regard.

    “WMG will help us set up its research laboratories here,” said IIT-Bhubaneswar director M. Chakraborty, who is back after spending a month at WMG.

    The director, in association with technology specialists there, held discussions and planned on the superspeciality laboratories.

    “We will work together towards setting up of high-end laboratories for materials and tomography processes as for example,” said the director, who has been appointed a visiting professor at WMG.

    … “We wish to draw on WMG’s successful record procedures of engaging with the local industry,” he said, adding that during his visit to the UK he worked with WMG director Lord Kumar Bhattacharya and other people on industry-academia relationships and development of some new education modules.

    A team of WMG research staff and industrialists will shortly be visiting IIT-Bhubaneswar to explore opportunities for the partnership. Experts from mineral and materials technology, e -security design disciplines and those who will foster good industry–academia relationship will comprise the team, he said. IIT-Bhubaneswar has already appointed an architect — the first among the new IITs to do so.

    “Consulting Engineering Services India Private Limited has been roped in for the purpose. The master plan is ready. We plan to start from November,” he said.

• Excerpt from Warwick VC’s statement: WMG’s technology specialists have advised on IIT Bhubaneshwar’s multi-million pound plans to set up laboratories in materials and tomography and a dozen WMG research staff and allied industrialists will now visit India in November to continue to build the overall partnership with Kharagpur and Bhubaneshwar.

August 27th, 2010

Indian Institute of Public Health Bhubaneswar is the fourth IIPH to be operational; September 30 2010 deadline for future faculty program

Its web page is http://www.phfi.org/iiph/iiphb.html. Following is today’s screen shot of that page.

IIPH’s are developed by the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI). PHFI has a future faculty program. Following is an excerpt from the page http://www.phfi.org/careers/ffproramme.html about that program.

Under the Future Faculty Programme, PHFI is pleased to announce the following fellowships

WELLCOME TRUST PROGRAMME (2009-2014)

In 2009, PHFI, along with a consortium of 14 British Universities, was awarded a £ 5 million (pounds) capacity building grant for faculty development. This ambitious 5 year programme aims to develop the teaching and research skills of PHFI’s faculty members by supporting their growth at various career stages. This programme includes opportunities for graduate and doctoral studies, collaborative research projects and research fellowships, and faculty exchanges.

Under this programme, PHFI invites applications for :

• Masters studies in public health (Duration: 1 year)
• Doctoral studies in public health (Duration: 3 years)
• Research fellowships in public health (Duration: 2 years)

Please click on the individual links above to know more about eligibility, application process, timelines and other details.

PHFI-DEAKIN FELLOWSHIP

PHFI is pleased to announce a PhD fellowship under the FFP, for professionals keen on doctoral studies in Public Health at Deakin University, Australia.

Please click here to know more about this. 

Note: The deadline of the following two programs is September 30, 2010.

• Masters studies in public health (Duration: 1 year)
• Doctoral studies in public health (Duration: 3 years)
  

August 21st, 2010

Standing advertisement for faculty positions at IIT Bhubaneswar

The following is from http://www.iitbbs.ac.in/admin/notice_board/1282304362WebAdvt-2010.pdf.

IIT Bhubaneswar invites applications for faculty positions at the level of Professor, Associate Professor, Assistant Professor and Assistant Professor (on contractual basis) in the following five Schools:

Schools (Disciplines): School of Mechanical Sciences (Mechanical Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering and Materials), School of Electrical Sciences (Electrical Engineering, Electronics & Telecommunication Engineering, Computer Science & Engineering), School of Infrastructure (Civil Engineering), School of Basic Sciences (Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics and Bioscience) and School of HSS & Management (English, Economics, Philosophy and Psychology).

MINIMUM QUALIFICATION
Ph.D. with first class or equivalent in the preceding degree in appropriate branch with a very good academic record throughout and evidence of ability to pursue independent high quality research.

EXPERIENCE

Professor: A minimum of 10 years teaching / research / industrial experience of which at least 4 years should be at the level of Associate Professor in IITs, IISc Bangalore, IIMs, NITIE Mumbai and IISERs or at an equivalent level in any such other Indian or foreign institutions of comparable standards.

Associate Professor: At least 6 years teaching / research / industrial experience of which at least 3 years should be at the level of Assistant Professor, Senior Scientific Officer / Senior Design Engineer.

Assistant Professor: At least 3 years teaching / research / industrial experience excluding, however, the experience gained while pursuing Ph.D.

Assistant Professor (on contractual basis): May have less than 3 years teaching / research / industrial experience.

SCALE OF PAY:

(Position; Pay Band; Minimum Pay In the Payband; Academic Grade Pay)

• Professor; PB4: Rs. 37400 – Rs. 67000; Rs. 48000; Rs. 10500
• Associate Professor; PB4: Rs. 37400 – Rs. 67000; Rs. 42800; Rs. 9500
• Assistant Professor; PB3: Rs. 15600 – Rs. 39100 ; Rs. 30000; Rs. 8000 (On completion of 3 Yrs of service shall move to PB4: Rs. 37400 – Rs. 67000; Rs 9000)
• Assistant Professor (on contractual basis); PB3: Rs. 15600 – Rs. 39100; Rs. 20140;
  • With less than or equal to one year experience: Rs. 6000
  • With more than one year experience: Rs. 7000
  • In the above cases experience will be counted excluding that gained while pursuing Ph.D.

In addition to above pay, allowances as admissible to Central Government employees are applicable.

OTHER INCENTIVES

1. A cumulative Professional Development Allowance of Rs. 3 lakhs for every block period of 3 years on reimbursement basis to meet the expenses for attending international/national conferences, paying membership fees of professional bodies, covering book grant, paying telephone charges and meeting contingent expenses etc. as per Institute guidelines.

2. Initial seed grant up to Rs.5 lakhs for initiating research project in a chosen area.

3. Reimbursement of relocation charges at the time of joining up to a ceiling of Rs. 90,000/- as per Institute norm.

4. Honorarium of Rs. 15,000/- per month to the faculty members who have obtained Bhatnagar Award OR are Fellows of at least two National Academies. A faculty member is entitled for only one honorarium.

NOTES

• Reservation for SC/ST/OBC/PH as per Government of India rules.
• Minimum requirement of experience may be relaxed in respect of outstanding candidates.
• Mere eligibility will not vest any right on any candidate for being called for interview. The decision of the Institute in all matters of selection will be final.
• The Institute reserves the right to call only the requisite number of candidates for interview after shortlisting in terms of the candidates’ qualification, suitability and experience.
• For the post of Assistant Professor the candidates should be preferably below 35 years of age
• Canvassing in any manner would entail disqualification of the candidature.

NO INTERIM ENQUIRIES WILL BE ENTERTAINED.

HOW TO APPLY

Candidates possessing the requisite qualification and experience may submit their application in the prescribed form either in hard-copy or by e-mail to the Assistant Registrar (A&E), Indian Institute of Technology Bhubaneswar, Samantapuri, Bhubaneswar – 751013 (email: faculty.app@iitbbs.ac.in).

Application form can be downloaded from the Institute website (www.iitbbs.ac.in or www.iitbbs.gov.in).

Applicants desiring to apply for more than one School should send separate application for
each School.

The candidates applying from Government Organizations or Public Sector Undertaking should have their applications duly forwarded by their present employer.

The candidates may apply any time throughout the year. The Institute will consider the applications at any date in the year received up to that date depending on its requirements and/or the quality of the applications.

First round of selection process will start after 20th September, 2010.

Registrar
Advt. No : R/5/2010 Dated 20.08.2010

1 comment August 21st, 2010

IIT Bhubaneswar Research Park: Question in Rajya Sabha

1 comment August 19th, 2010

IISc Bangalore to start 4 year B.S program starting from 2011

(Thanks to Abi for the pointer.)

The web page for this program is http://www.iisc.ernet.in/ug/index.htm. Following are some excerpts from its main page.

The Indian Institute of Science, a leading institution of higher learning with a strong tradition of research for over a century, is opening its portals to undergraduate students by launching a four-year Bachelor of Science (BS) Programme. The programme is designed as a balanced blend of core science and interdisciplinary topics, to serve as a launching pad for research and doctoral studies in cutting-edge areas in science and technology. The graduates will also be ready for attractive career opportunities in academia and industry.

Major Disciplines offered: Biology, Chemistry, Environmental Science, Materials, Mathematics and Physics.

Students majoring in any of the above disciplines will also take courses in engineering, humanities, and inter-disciplinary areas for a well-rounded learning experience.

The inaugural batch will begin classes from August 2011 and graduate in July 2015.

Admissions will be based on national examinations such as KVPY and through other channels to be announced soon.

Eligibility: 12th Standard or equivalent with Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics as main subject.

Applications will be accepted from January 1, 2011 till March 31, 2011.

August 19th, 2010

NISER Bhubaneswar seems to be designed to have 250 regular faculty plus 100 visiting faculty

I noticed that the fact that NISER currently has 43 regular faculty and 18 visiting faculty is not by accident or not because the institute is new and it needs visiting faculty to help in teaching, but is because NISER is designed to have additional 40% faculty as visiting faculty.

This comes out clearly in the design specs for the academic campus. For example, in https://www.orissalinks.com/archives/1820 it is clearly stated that there will be offices for 250 faculty and additional 100 visiting faculty. This is in addition to having space for 150 post-doctoral fellows. (IISERs talk about 200 faculty and do not mention visiting faculty.)

This feature of having about additional 40% visiting faculty is more of a feature of DAE institutes like TIFR and is in contrast to most MHRD institutions. For example, the IISERs do not have that many visiting faculty.

Having such a high percentage of visiting faculty will enrich NISER’s environment and will be one of its signature distinguishing features. It will also help in faculty recruitment in that it can take in some highly regarded prospective faculty immediately as visiting faculty while they go through the formal approval process of a regular faculty position.

NISER has not yet advertised or highlighted about this feature of having such a high percent of visiting faculty positions. It should. Also, it should spread the word about its visiting positions widely to attract visitors from all over the world.

Another design feature of NISER vis-a-vis IISERs is its lower faculty student ratio. Its target is to have 250 regular faculty plus 100 visiting faculty and 1750 students (including 150 post-docs); making it a target ratio of 1:7 (if one just counts the regular faculty). In comparison IISERs are designed to have 200 faculty and 2055 students (including post-docs); making it a target ratio of 1:10.

While NISER’s target faculty-student ratio is 1:7, its current regular-faculty-student ratio is about 1:4.6. That means NISER is ahead in its faculty recruiting. For this  all kudos go to the NISER director Prof. T. K. Chandrashekar.

1 comment August 16th, 2010

NIT Rourkela to be funded by Vedanta to develop a cost-effective method for neutralisation of red mud

Following is a from a PTI report in ibnlive.com.

National Institute of Technology-Rourkela and Vedanta Aluminium today signed an Mou to develop an environment-friendly technology.Vedanta will finance NIT-R to develop a cost-effective method for neutralisation of red mud and removal of poisonous heavy metals like arsenic, zinc and cadmium and to upscale the technology to industrial scale. …

Disposal of red mud, the waste product of aluminium manufacture had been bothering aluminium industries and governments and causing environment hazard. The disposal methods being followed has been creating problem of contamination of ground and surface water.Kumar said red mud mostly contain 50 per cent of iron ore and the aluminium industries want to reduce the level to zero.

August 12th, 2010