Sambada reports that through its charitable trust “Sambada and Ama Odisha trust” it has opened a school of mass communication and culture. This college has permission from the state government and the Utkal University of Culture. This year it will start a 2 year post graduate degree course on Journalism and Mass Communication. There will be an entrance exam to select students. The college plans to make arrangements so that 100% of its students get jobs.
June 22nd, 2007
New Indian Express reports that Regional Medical Research Center in Bhubaneswar will now have facility for diagnosis of viral infections. Following are some excerptss from that report.
Giving a much-needed boost to viral diseases surveillance in Orissa, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has identified Regional Medical Research Centre (RMRC) here as one of its diagnostic centres. …
Keeping in view the overburdened NIV, the council decided to establish facilities for diagnosis of viral infections at centres having expertise in molecular biology and bio-technology.
The expert group of the council had met recently to discuss establishment of new virology laboratories in the country and identified three such categories of labs as part of the network. RMRC, it said, falls in the first category of labs basing on its strategic location in outbreak-prone areas.
ICMR will build capacity of RMRC as part of this new networking.
June 22nd, 2007
Pragativadi reports that the central government has sent a proposal asking which university in the state it wants to be recommended as a central university. Following are some excerpts from that report.
The Centre has yet again proposed the state government to identify one of the universities of the state to be accorded with Central University status.
A letter from the Union HRD ministry to the state government has assured that the Centre would provide cent percent financial assistance for converting any one of the state universities into a Central University. …
Meanwhile, the state higher education department, that has received the recent letter from the HRD ministry, is reviewing its consideration it had taken earlier. Sources in the official circles however, said that the state government is in a fix to recommend the name of the university to obtain central varsity status.
My initial take on this is that the state government pick one of its current university, but say in the letter that in view of the necessity of a central university in KBK, the picked university will have to have branch campuses across KBK and thus will need adequate funding for that. The long term goal then would be to convert the KBK branch campuses to a separate central university at an appropriate time in the future.
June 21st, 2007
The Orissa JEE has come out with an additional list and ranking of students beyond the initial 21455 ranks. See details in the Orissa JEE page. Here is what it says:
New Indian Express has a nice report on this with additional information.
June 21st, 2007
Dear Mr. Ramesh:
I read about your visit to Bhubaneswar and some news reports and quotes of yours in Statesman. (See article below.)
1. One of them says:
“I do not want to score political points but what if I ask what were these people doing in all the six years that the NDA was in power. The IIT could have come up in six years time , what were you (the BJD) doing when all that you needed was to take up the file to Mr Vajpayee and he would have signed it,” shot back Mr Ramesh.
2. Another paragraph of that report says:
Repeatedly emphasising that he was one with the demand of the state for institutes of higher education, Mr Ramesh said at the same time, one should realise that an IIT will solve the problem of unemployment. Has Kanpur IIT contributed in any way to Kanpur? In fact, IITs have contributed more to the US economy than Indian economy, he remarked.
===
Mr. Ramesh: I don’t know if your intent was to score political points or if this is your thinking. You are quoted as saying that “you do not want to score political points”, so these must be your real views.
(1′) Your comment (1) implies that a state can get an IIT (or similar institute) only when its coalition is in power in Delhi. Do you really mean that? So is the UPA government in Delhi only for states with UPA friendly governments and the rest should go to hell in regards to higher education institutions? Not only that you seem to be implying that it is not right (timing) for Orissa to ask for an IIT now because the ruling party of the state is not aligned with the center.
Continue Reading June 21st, 2007
Someone asked the above question in Yahoo Answers India! Following was my answer.
Which option is better IISER, NIT or IIST and why?
It depends on what you want. The goal of IISERs and NISER Bhubaneswar is to focus on science and produce good scientists. If you have a choice between these institutes, you are a pretty good student. Whatever you do seriously you will be successful. Be confident of that. Heck, even graduates of private colleges in backwater towns get jobs.
So now, IISERs were made because India was falling behind in Science. In the past India had great scientists some of whom went on to get Nobel prizes. But with the IIT brand name and corresponding hype (I am an ex-IITian) every one, who can, now goes to IIT and most study engineering. Science departments, although exist in IITs, have a second class status. That has resulted in India falling behind in Science.
So the government’s aim in establishing IISERs and NISER Bhubaneswar was to create as good institutes as IITs but focused on Science.
One must realize that basic research in science later leads to developments in Engineering and Technology. So unless good talent also goes to science, the pipeline will become empty.
So, if you want to study science, you should go to IISERs or NISER. If your goal is to get a degree, and a job or to go for MBA (in IIMs) after that, then NITs are better for you.
June 21st, 2007
Update: The IIT JEE 2008 counseling brochure is at http://www.jee.iitb.ac.in/CBrochure.pdf.
The 2007 IIT JEE Counseling brochure is available at http://www.jee.iitb.ac.in/2007/CBJEE_2007.pdf. Using it one can get a rough idea of ones chances based on their JEE rank. I wish and hope BPUT will create such a counseling brochure for Orissa JEE with prior year’s information.
June 20th, 2007
As per a report in Times of India, Ganjam district has the maximum number of out-of-school students in Orissa. It has 63,546 out of school students. The state govt. should pay special attention to Ganjam in this regard.
June 20th, 2007
The higher education department of the government of Orissa is preparing a vision document which will be placed in the assembly. This is reported in several parts in New Indian Express (part1, part2, part3) and other papers. Following are some of the salient points; some of them are being debated and others have been decided.
- student evaluation of teachers
- higher fees in autonomous colleges
- common entrance tests for admission to autonomous colleges
- replacing pass/fail with grades
- introduction of career oriented courses
- all colleges subject to NAAC rating
- fundamental knowledge of computers for all students
- self financing courses on foreign languages
- placement cells in colleges
June 20th, 2007
