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.
Punjab National Bank (PNB) has decided to set up a Farmers’ Training Centre (FTC) in Orissa.
… "We have requested the Orissa Chief Minister, Naveen Patnaik, to allot at least seven acres at a prime location, preferably in Bhubaneswar for the establishment of the farmers’ training centre. The matter is pending with the government and we are eagerly awaiting the state government’s response. As soon as we receive the state government’s nod we will start construction activities," said Bimal Prasad Sharma, zonal manager of the bank in Bhubaneswar.
The bank has urged the state government to give it the piece of land free of cost.
The other expenditure for the training centre including the construction of the building, appointment of faculty members and other staff and their salaries, infrastructure and installation of equipments to train farmers from every nook and corner of the state will be borne by the bank, said Sharma.
The bank has already established seven such farmers’ training centres in Punjab, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, where the agriculture lending of the bank is comparatively higher than Orissa.
"About 80 percent people of Orissa are depending upon agriculture sector. The farmers are not being provided with update training on modern cultivation due to lack of farmers’ training centre. We have decided to establish the centre in Orissa to help its farmers", he said.
At the proposed institute, farmers will be trained with special focus on adoption of improved farm technology, diversification of crops, specially cash crops, repair and maintenance of agriculture implements.
Besides, special training on floriculture, horticulture, pisciculture, apiculture and animal husbandry will be imparted at the centre. "It is our social corporate responsibility to stand by the needy and deserved farmers as they are the back bone of our society," he said. …
“We have provisionally selected four places in Orissa for the farmers’ training centre. Our top priority is, the land should be provided in such a location where faculty members, communication and other infrastructure are available at hand", Sharma said, adding, "Our first preference is Bhubaneswar because it is the state capital where our zonal office is located. Secondly, Bhubaneswar has Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology from where we can take faculty to impart training”.
In 2007-08 fifty one (serial 95-145 in the list 2000-01 to 2007-08) new central schools have been created, out of these five are in Orissa. They are in:
100 Bouda
108 Gajapati
125 Malkangiri
127 Nabrangpur
132 Rayagada
This takes the total number of central schools in Orissa to 34. In addition there is some news that new central schools are also being made in Jajpur and Bhadrakh. They have not made it to the list yet. Assuming this is true, and looking at the district wise list of central schools, the districts in Orissa that do not yet have central schools are:
Deogarh
Kandhamala
Kendrapada
Nayagarh
Nuapada
Sonepur
Looking at the list of central schools in Orissa, it seems that the schools are more geographically distributed than most other states.
As many as 11 companies, half of them from IT sector, visited the varsity over the past six months and picked up a number of students.
A considerable number of postgraduates were also chosen by multinationals from diverse sectors through off campus placement exercises. The department of Finance and Control achieved a record of sorts by scoring 100 percent result on this front. The department has 30 seats.
This is in sharp contrast to a period not so long back when departments scored a nought. Even students of humanities have secured employment. They include students from Sociology, Rural Development and Anthropology departments. CAPART, for instance, an autonomous body engaged in sustainable development of rural areas, recruited six students from these departments. A matching number was also recruited by Pradan, another leading New Delhi-based NGO.
And it has promised to visit the varsity in September to hold its second phase of recruitment drive. Legal recruitment firm Juriscape India has also evinced keen interest to visit the campus shortly. It would be targeting students of Law, English and Journalism departments. The recruited ones would be absorbed as content writers, legal aid assistants and researchers.
Offers have also come in for students of the department of Fisheries Science. Companies like IFB-Agro Industries and Bay Seafood, both Kolkata-based firms, would be holding recruitment drives in the coming months.
Tech firms like Infosys, TCS, Wipro BPO, HSBC, Genpact Mindtree, Subex Azure, Mindfire Solutions and Exillant have already conducted several rounds of placement drives. …
An Indian Express article mentions the surprising result of several IIM Lucknow students mentoring +2 students of a local college. I hope more such mentoring happens. Is anyone from XIM reading this?
(Update on June 17 2008: For guidance on what you can get with your Orissa JEE rank in 2008, please see https://www.orissalinks.com/archives/1185 I do not have more information than that.)
The Empowered committee also cleared a proposal to create a post of Chair professor in the Department of Metallurgy in IIT, Kharagpur, Benaras Hindu University and NITS at Rourkela, Durgapur and Jamshedpur and other institutes, where study of Metallurgical Engineering is pursued at a salary at par with the individual institute’s norm. These institutions will also provide scholarships to five undergraduate students in each of them to pursue studies in areas related to iron and steel. The undergraduate scholarships will carry a monthly stipend of Rs.4000 per month during the entire period of the course.
The U.S. produces about 1,400 Ph.D.s in computer science annually and China about 3,000. By stark comparison, India’s annual computer science Ph.D. production languishes at roughly 40. That number is about the same as that for Israel, a nation with roughly 5% of India’s population size.
While India needs all the new IITs, IIITs and Central Universities that the PM announced during his Aug 15 speech, one wonders where from these institutions will get Ph.Ds for their faculty. The government and the IT industry must brainstorm together and come up with a strategy to tackle this. Following are some initial un-coordinated half-baked thoughts.
Start motivating good students from an early age about the value of research. This can be done through science magnet schools.
In IITs and IISc and may be a few other selected institutions have a track similar to MD/PH.D tracks in US medical schools. Students in this track would pursue a B.Tech-P.hD program (no need for MS) and would be given a generous stipends.
To allow more time for IIT/IISc faculty to pursue research and guide Ph.D students these institutions (especially their CS depts.) should take in more M.Tech students and let them do most of the teaching.
Government should open special graduate centers in IT/Computer Science (may be as branches of exisiting IITs) that only focus on research. For example, the IIT Kharagpur center in Bhubaneswar may house a faculty of 5-10 CS professors and offer *only* a Ph.D program in computer science. Such centers may have affiliated faculty (who have Ph.Ds) from nearby engineering colleges. Such centers should be slowly opened in every metropolitan area with 15+ engineering colleges. (The IIITs could have served this purpose but it seems most IIITs are focusing on undergraduate education. Exceptions are IIIT Hyderabad, which has a good research program; IIIT Bangalore which only offers M.Tech and Ph.D and the nascent IIIT Bhubaneswar which will also only have M.Tech and Ph.D program, at least in the beginning. )
Government needs to offer better salary and perks to professors so that more students are attracted to a career in academia.
