Now that Koraput has been announced by the CM as well as in the assembly as the location for a central university, lets be happy about it. I know some of the other districts who wanted the central university to be there may have reasons to be unhappy. My suggestion to them, especially for people (and my friends) from Kalahandi, is to continue their efforts for a new central university and pursue other avenues such as a state university and a BPIET.
Now celebrating Koraput, following are some good aspects of Koraput.
- Koraput area is a cluster of several towns which could become a sizeable metropolitan area in the near future. As per the population numbers in this site and this site the towns around Koraput and their population are: Jeypore: 84,136 (20 km from Koraput); Koraput: 39,523; Sunabeda: 62,706 (20 km from Koraput); and Damanjodi: 8,475. The total may now surpass 200,000.
- The Kolab resorvoir is a picturesque area for a central university. The university is proposed to be between Koraput at Sunabeda on the bank of this resorvoir.
December 19th, 2008
The following is from Samaja.
It is high time people of Kalahandi go to the CM for higher education institutes in Kalahandi. In particular they should demand a state university and a centrally funded BPIET (Biju Patnaik Inst of Engineering and Technology) in the line of SLIET and ABA Ghani Khan Choudhury IET. The people of Kalahandi need to be strategic in terms of what they can get at this time. For example, UCE Burla supporters initially, for several years, were going after a deemed university status. It was going very slowly. Once they switched to demanding for state unitary university status, things happened fast. Similarly, people of Kalahandi should realize that they should not put all their egg in one basket. IMHO, shifting of the location from Koraput to Kalahandi after the location is announced by the CM and mentioned in the assembly is unlikely, and I hope I am wrong, but a new central university in Kalahandi has a low chance of happening soon. So as a practical matter people of Kalahandi should, for now, ask for a state university and a BPIET. They don’t have to retract their demand for a central university; that can continue.
December 19th, 2008