Odisha HRD

Contributions of OUAT Scientists to Agriculture: a Samaja article

1 comment August 24th, 2007

Another new engineering college gets AICTE approval

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.

August 24th, 2007

Tribal University Bill introduced by Arjun Singh in Rajya Sabha

Following are excerpts from a report in Hindu.

The Indira Gandhi National Tribal University Bill to set up a tribal university in Madhya Pradesh was introduced in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday by Union Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh.

To be set up an estimated cost of Rs. 60 crore during the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, the university will have its headquarters in Amarkantak and will be a Central university.

Though headquartered in Amarkantak, it will have a number of regional centres and campuses in the tribal areas, particularly in the Indian heartland.

According to the ‘Statement of Objects and Reasons’ attached to the Bill, Amarkantak was chosen because there was no Central university specifically catering to the population in the tribal concentrated areas of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Gujarat. This is in contrast to the other area of high tribal concentration — the North-East .

While the proposed university is aimed at facilitating and promoting avenues of higher education and research facilities for the tribal population of the country, it will take in students from other sections of society also.

… Besides providing access to higher education to the tribals of Central India in particular, it will promote research in tribal art, culture, tradition, language, medicinal systems, customs, and forest-based economic activities.

My observations: The budget sounds too low. With that fixed some of the regional centers and campuses should be in Orissa.

2 comments August 24th, 2007

Children joining special schools under Child Labor Project

The following is from a PIB release.

The number of children who have been withdrawn from hazardous jobs and have been admitted to special schools under the National Child Labour Project (NCLP) Scheme has more than doubled during the last three years.  Their number has increased from 1,67,825 in 2004-05 to 3,37,269 in 2006-07.  These children in the age group of 9 to 14 years are provided with accelerated bridging education and other benefits like stipend, mid-day meal, vocational training, health check-ups, etc. in special schools for a maximum period of three years to enable them to join regular mainstream education system.

            The state-wise details of the children enrolled in special schools under NCLP is as follows:

Similarly, the number of children enrolled in special schools under the Indo-US (INDUS) Project has also seen an increase during the last three years as follows:

August 24th, 2007