UCE Burla becoming VSSUT and the hiring of dynamic vice Chancellors at VSSUT (Prof. D K Tripathy from IIT Kharagpur) as well as at Sambalpur University (Prof. Arun Pujari from the University of Hyderabad) has given a huge momentum in making the Sambalpur area a knowledge hub and together with similar progress at Rourkela a western knowledge corridor is now in the making. In this write-up we will focus on the greater Sambalpur area ranging from Bargarh in the west of Sambalpur to Jharsuguda and Sundergarh in the north and north east.
- Universities: Two exists; 2 more in the making
- There are two universities with dynamic leadership at their helm: VSSUT and Sambalpur University
- Sambalpur University has received approval and funding for a SU-IIT (Sambalpur University Institute of Information Technology) and is pursuing a sports institute.
- VSSUT has significant expansion plans.
- There is a proposal to upgrade GM college to a unitary university.
- The health minister had announced to upgrade VSS Medical College to a university.
- Branch of OUAT in Chipilima.
- Engineering Colleges: Besides VSSUT, there are five more engineering colleges in the area. 2 in Baragarh, 1 in Jharsuguda, 1 in Sundergarh and 1 in Sason (Silicon West).
- Management Institute: XIMB plans a campus in this area.
- Centrally funded Institutes: IIHT (Indian Institute of Handloom Technology) in Baragarh.
- Research Institute: CIFT Burla.
- Other Colleges: Panchayat College Baragarh, NSCB College Sambalpur, Govt. Womens College Sambalpur, Govt. College Sundergarh and Govt. Womens College Sundergarh.
- Demography: See https://www.orissalinks.com/orissagrowth/archives/2715
- Infrastructure:
The above gives the current status of this area. In addition to the efforts mentioned above, following should also be pursued.
- The VSSUT must be upgraded to a national level institute such as an IIEST (Indian Institute of Engineering Science & Technology)
- An STP must be established in Sambalpur.
- Operationalization of Jharsuguda airport must be expedited.
- One of the central government departments such as CSIR, DAE, Sc & Tech, etc. needs to open a research center here.
- The Orissa government should push to upgrade the VSS Medical College to the AIIMS level.
- Establishment of private medical colleges in this area must be encouraged.
- The OUAT college in Chipilima needs to upgraded and expanded
- A regional university (similar to the old regional engineering colleges, with 50-50 partnership between the state and the central govt.) should be established in Jharsuguda. (This could be part of the 12th five year plan starting from 2012.)
- A state university should be established in Jharsuguda during the 13th plan. (by 2020)
- A state university should be established in Baragarh during the 13th plan. (by 2020)
- Considering the rapid industrialization of the area, the Govt. Engineering School in Jharsuguda should be upgraded to an engineering college, perhaps as a constituent college of VSSUT.
NOTE on Comments: Only constructive comments will be allowed. Please do not submit comments that advocate separatism, conspiracy theories, shifting, badmouthing, etc.
March 14th, 2010
Update: See also https://www.orissalinks.com/orissagrowth/archives/4308.
Rourkela is the second largest metropolitan area of Orissa with an official metropolitan population of 550,668 but perhaps much more (at least 700 K) if one takes into account nearby places like Biramitrapur and Rajgangpur. It is probably the most cosmopolitan area of Orissa. Because of its steel plant it has world-wide name recognition. It has a lot of young talents; I am told that Rourkela youngsters have done much better in entrance exams like IIT JEE than from other parts of Orissa. Rourkela and the Sundergarh district have produced many national hockey players (both male and female), some of whom have gone on to captain the Indian national side.
Being an important station in the Mumbai-Howrah line, Rourkela is very well connected to both. The National Institute of Technology at Rourkela is often ranked among the top 5 NITs of the country; in recent years it has done much better and is in the process of starting a business program. Rourkela also has two private engineering colleges and at least one more is in the works. Rourkela has at least two good magament schools: Rourkela Institute of Management Studies (sometimes ranked nationally) and Indian Institute of Production Management, Kansbahal.
Overall, Rourkela has the potential to be a Tier II city of India at the level of Vizag, Chandigarh, etc. But unfortunately, that has not happened so far and active organized efforts need to be made to achieve that.
So here I will list some of the things that should be pursued so that Rourkela becomes a Tier II city of India.
Knowledge and HRD aspects:
- Metropolitan University: Rourkela is perhaps the largest metropolitan area of the country, or may be the whole world which does not have a general university. This needs to be rectified at the earliest. IMHO, the best model to follow would be of Delhi University. So a Rourkela Metropolitan University should be established with graduate programs as well as with a few constituent colleges spread (offering Bachelors as well as Masters degrees) across the metropolitan area, but with no affiliated colleges. The exisiting government colleges in Rourkela (Govt. College, Rourkela; SG Women’s, Rourkela and Rourkela College) would be made constituents of this university.
- Medical College: Although a WODC sponsored PPP-based medical college is in the works, we must continue pursuing an ESIC medical college here. SAIL, which is making a medical college in Bokaro, should also be pushed to establish a medical college here.
- BPUT: BPUT must become fully operational from Rourkela.It needs to have real departments and centers and offer its own courses. It should be expanded to have programs in Science and Humanities.
- Research Centers: The state should pursue one of the central government departments such as CSIR, DAE, Sc & Tech, etc. to open a research center in Rourkela.
- Centrally funded University: At some point a centrally funded university should be pursued for Rourkela.
- More private institutions: Rourkela has the population base and the amenities that metropolitan areas offer to have more private institutions such as engineering colleges, management institutions etc. A multi-pronged apporoach should be taken.
- Local big industries should be cajoled to participate in this. For example, SAIL is also planning an engineering college in Bokaro. They should be pushed to have one in Rourkela.
- Local people should also open private institutions on their own.
- Educational foundations inside and outside state that have developed good private institutions should be approached and invited to open institutions in Rourkela. Inside Orissa, institutions like Silicon and NIST should be approached.
- STP: The STP at Rourkela should be expanded.
- IT/BPO: Because of the cosmopolitan nature of Rourkela, it would be a good place for BPO and call center operations. This should be pursued.
- Sports Institute/University: Sundergrah district is considered by many to be the Hockey cradle of India, both in men’s and women’s hockey. It has produced both Men’s and Women’s hockey team captains in Dilip Tirkey and Jyoti Sunita Kullu. Orissa government should pursue to establish a National Sports Institute (of the kind in Patiala) in Rourkela. It should include programs in physical training, coach training, official training etc. This would specially contribute in the enhancing the employment opportunities for Adivasis who constitute 50.74% of Sundergarh’s population.
Connectivity Aspects:
- Rail Connectivity -Trains: While the connectivity to Mumbai and Kolkata is marvelous, connectivity to other places needs improvement. Dilip has a good list of new trains needed for Rourkela at http://rourkelarail.wetpaint.com/page/DEMANDS. This list is:
- Rourkela-Bhubaneswar Intercity Express( Day Time)
- Rourkela-Berhampur Gajapati Express
- Rourkela-Secundarabad/Hyderabad Express
- Trains to New Delhi from Bhubaneswar via Rourkela OR Rourkela-Nizamuddin/New Delhi Express (Any extension of Ranchi-Hatia or Tatanagar trains will also work)
- Trains to Patna and Eastern U.P.
- Rail Connectivity-Others: The Talcher-Bimlagarh line must be fast-tracked.
- Roads: The 4-laning of the state highway 10 connecting Sambalpur and Rourkela must be expedited.
- Air Connectivity: Rourkela airport must be made functional with commercial flights at the earliest.
Metro area:
- A larger metropolitan area for Rourkela that includes Kansbahal and Rajgangpur in the west and Biramitrapur in the North must be formally established.
- The state government should pursue Rourkela to be included in JNNURM.
(The above is from Google Maps.)
(The above is from "sarini: Occasional papers, No. 4, Adivasis of Rourkela")
Work in Progress…
November 15th, 2009
See the table below obtained from http://www.dheorissa.in/DHE/PG.aspx?lnk=Cou.
Continue Reading November 12th, 2009
Following is from the page http://www.dheorissa.in/DHE/Initiatives.aspx?lnk=ini.
To popularise Science education in backward areas Government has decided to open Colleges in the the districts of Malkangiri and Nuapada. Three more Government +2 Science Colleges at Kutra (Sundargarh), Tiring (Mayurbhanj) and Jirang ( Gajapati) are going to be esablished.
November 12th, 2009
Following is an excerpt from a report in Times of India.
… law minister Veerappa Moily has designed a grand plan to set up four regional institutes of excellence to equip lawyers and bring them on par with Indian IT professionals, who are known the world over for their competence.
Moily prefers to call these regional institutes of excellence simply "regional hubs" of legal education. "We have written to the Planning Commission for approval of the plan to set up these four institutes which will match standards of best law institutes anywhere in the world," he said, adding this move was spurred by one of the recommendations of the National Knowledge Commission.
September 24th, 2009
Our sister site in Twitter is http://twitter.com/orissalinks. (Often when we are busy or do not feel like writing a full posting here, we post a micro-blog in our Twitter sister site. The Twitter sister site also automatically adds the headline from this site and the orissagrowth site. Once in a while we will collect those headlines here. But readers wanting a broader and more immediate coverage should consider following our Twitter site at http://twitter.com/orissalinks.) Following are some selected items from that site since July 12th.
August 20th, 2009
This was part of a package that the state government had announced after the Kandhamal events.
August 2nd, 2009
July 9th, 2009
Following is an excerpt from a report in Expressbuzz.com.
Currently, Orissa has 29 lead or Grade-I colleges where a professor-grade person will be the principal and for the degree colleges a reader-grade person has to become a principal, but despite assurances, the State Government is yet to come out with a complete list of eligible candidates. On the other hand, since 1998 no selection was made for lecturer posts of UGC-grade for the degree and lead colleges making the situation worse.
Currently, Orissa has 29 lead or Grade-I colleges where a professor-grade person will be the principal and for the degree colleges
a reader-grade person has to become a principal, but despite assurances, the State Government is yet to come out with a complete list of eligible candidates. On the other hand, since 1998 no selection was made for lecturer posts of UGC-grade for the degree and lead colleges making the situation worse.
… Contacted, Higher Education Secretary Madhusudan Padhi said as the `functional structure is based on a pyramidal concept’, there are many `issues’ to be addressed at grass-root level and the Department had already given a requisition to the Orissa Public Service Commission to recruit 2,800 junior lecturers at the earliest.
June 23rd, 2009
June 22nd, 2009
June 22nd, 2009
This institute is established by Ministry of Tourism Government of India and Government of Orissa. This is the only centrally funded institute in the Balangir district.
May 28th, 2009
April 27th, 2009
The web page of ZEE Institute of Creative Arts is http://www.zica.org.There head office is Mumbai and as per their "Contact Us" page it currently has two campuses in Mumbai and Bhubaneswar. Following is an excerpt from a news Item in Express Buzz about the opening of their Bhubaneswar Campus.
Adding another feather to Capital’s list of institutions offering career-oriented professional courses, Zee Institute of Creative Arts (ZICA) today opened its centre here at Niladri Vihar.
With animation industry in India poised to grow at 27 per cent to reach a 1,163 million dollar mark by 2012, the institute hopes to provide affordable animation courses to cater to the manpower demands when Bollywood alone plans to make another 12 feature films based on animation and special effects. Also the gaming industry is all set to grow rapidly with a huge demand of professionals.
Addressing mediapersons, Head, Youth Business, Zee Learn, Subhadarshi Tripathy said as traditionally Orissa has many well-known animation artists engaged at the national level, ZICA thought it appropriate to open its second centre outside Mumbai here so that students from the entire Eastern Indian states can be given an opportunity to learn the art and equip themselves to take various career opportunities in film making, visual effects, television production and advertising industry.
‘‘ZICA, which first started in Hyderabad way back in 1995, was later shifted to the Esselworld campus in Mumbai and has become the pioneer animation institute with its distinct training style and approach towards industry-oriented curriculum’’, he said adding, however, to maintain quality it never ‘‘opened branches elsewhere outside the city of dreams’’.
The local centre will impart a two-year diploma in animation film making and one-year course in digital arts, but later would also introduce short-term courses. ‘‘While the two-year course would need an investment of around Rs 3 lakh, the short-term ones may vary from Rs 40-75,000’’, he said adding, compared to Mumbai, the local centre will be more affordable with the same standard of teaching and infrastructure facilities.
‘‘For each course there would be a six-faculty team apart from industry professionals as guest faculty and the teacher-student ratio would be around 1:4’’, he pointed out. …
April 25th, 2009
As per comment 3 of an earlier post of ours, The National Law University Act, 2008 (Orissa Act 4 Of 2008) was published in the Orissa Gazette (Extraordinary) Vide No.2215, dated 4th December, 2008. So the official establishment year of this university will be 2008.
Following are excerpts from a report in tathya.in about the appointment of the first vice chancellor of this university.
Professor Faizan Mustafa is the first Vice Chancellor of the National Law University of Orissa (NLUO).
Justice Dr. Balbir Singh Chouhan, Chief Justice of Orissa High court and the Chancellor of NLUO has appointed him in the top post here on 6 April.
Professor Mustafa is at present the Director KIIT Law School, Bhubaneswar.
He is a gold medalist in LL.M. from Aligarh Muslim University. who had completed his Ph.D. in Intellectual Property Law.
Professor Mustafa also has a Diploma in International and Comparative Human Rights from International Institute of Human Rights, Strasbourg, France.
Before joining KLS as Director, he was Dean of Faculty of Law, AMU and Registrar of AMU for a period of two years. …
… Finally the NLUO is taking concrete shape with Prof.Mustafa at the helm and initiative of the Higher Education department to place funds for the institution.
The State Government has already provided Rs.5 crore to the Corpus Fund.
Naveen Patnaik, the Chief Minister laid foundation of the institution on 5 January at Brajabiharipur near Naraj in Cuttack district.
The State Government has allocated 30 acres of land free of cost.
Similar National Law Schools opened earlier in the other states are listed here. So far there were 12 of them in Bangalore (1986), Hyderabad (1998), Bhopal (1998), Kolkata (1999), Jodhpur (1999), Gandhinagar (2003), Raipur (2003), Kochi (2005), Lucknow (2005), Patiala (2006), Patna (2007), and Delhi (2008). Admission to all of them except the last one is through the common law admission test (CLAT).
April 7th, 2009
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