Odisha HRD

Vedanta University tries to nudge the Odisha government to action by threatening to move out of state

Following is a report by Kalpana Pathak from sify.com.

The estimated $3-bn Vedanta University was to start Phase-I by mid-2011 but is facing stiff opposition from locals.

The Anil Agarwal Foundation’s plan to set up a Rs 15,000- crore varsity in Puri (Orissa), called Vedanta University, has come a cropper. The management is now in talks with two southern states for alternative land to set up the varsity.

The Anil Agarwal Foundation’s Vedanta University is modeled on Stanford University and aims to be a worldclass, multi-disciplinary university with students from across India and around the world. However, the varsity, which was to begin operations by mid-2011, has not even started the basic infrastructure work on the land due to stiff opposition from locals and lack of political support.

… "We sought support from the state government but it is silent. We agreed to set up the university on government’s invitation but now we are very disappointed. We even revised our initial plans of having the campus on 8,000 to 6,000 acres," admits an official from the university who did not wish to be named. The university board has managed to acquire around 4,000 acres of land so far.

A director of a local institute told Business Standard: "The university concept as such is a good one and considering the varsity is facing stiff opposition from locals, the foundation should look for a smaller piece of land and begin operations."

The Foundation says if it’s not able to set up the university in Orissa, the land acquired could be made into an extended arm of the university which, could be housed outside Orissa.

The Foundation and the state government in 2006, had signed a memorandum of understanding to create the University. In July 2009, the government of Orissa passed a bill to allow the massive university to be set up and function with autonomy. The university being built with an investment of Rs 15,000 crore has plans to come up in three phases. Phase one was to be operational by mid-2011 with an investment of Rs 5,000 crore. The first academic session at the university was to begin in 2009 but the project has been delayed for over two years due to land acquisition tussle with the local residents of Puri. With further delays, the university could take longer to get operational.

To begin with, the university expects to start operations with around 1,000 students in the arts and science streams. The student intake, however, will grow steadily to reach an ultimate goal of 100,000 students. The university board however, is still working on the modalities involving admission and fee structure.

The university has awarded construction contracts of the academic buildings as well as the hospital at the project site to companies like Larsen & Toubro, Shapoorji Pallonji, Ahluwalia, B E Billimoria and Simplex. Architects Ayers Saint Gross of Baltimore, USA, have prepared the master plan of the University. Few international scholars like Will Chase, Pratap Bhanu Mehta and Sam Pitroda are said to have evinced interest in the project.

The campus will have a super specialty hospital, which will answer a long standing need for providing comprehensive and specialized patient care for the people of Orissa and eastern India. Both the University and the hospital are ‘not-for-profit’ institutions. World-renowned hospital architects are developing the design for the hospital, Perkins and Will from USA. The university will also establish research parks to promote science and technology-based entrepreneurship and support an innovation-driven incubator. E-learning programmes will also be launched in future.

At this point, I am not sure the state government is at fault. The state government has passed the Vedanta University Bill. The construction and further land acqusition is stopped by the environmental ministry of the central government (see here and here), and the high court case. I think for the latter Vedanta University Project and its official bear some responsibility as it seems that in their haste to speed up the process of land acquisition, they might not have dotted the i’s at the right time.

Nevertheless, as per the reported recommendations of the Lokpal, the issue is mostly technical. I hope both get resolved soon and the progress is resumed.

One thing the state government can do now is to initiate a dialog with the PM, HRD M and Ministry of Environment to sort out the environmental issues at the earliest. On its part Vedanta University Project should start taking actions as laid out in its act. It should also seriously consider starting some graduate programs at the earliest.

10 comments June 15th, 2010

Status of Sardar Raja’s Medical College and Hospital in Jaring, Kalahandi: Pioneer

Following are excerpts from a report in Pioneer.

Kalahandi’s Sardar Raja’s Medical College and Hospital (SRMCH), the foundation-stone for which was laid by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on February 8, 2004 at Jaring, named Naveen Town, is yet to cater to the needs of the region full-fledged.

Even after six years, the pending work of the hostel construction is yet to be completed.

Initially, the State Government had provided 25 acres of land at Jaring, en route Bhawanipatna to Junagarh, and the Western Odisha Development Council (WODC) had sanctioned Rs 10 crore (out of which Rs 9 crore has been received) for the establishment of the SRMCH.

The ongoing work began to slowdown when its chairman was convicted in a case by the Madras High Court ten months ago.

… However, Raja’s two sons often visit the Jaring-based SRMCH from Tamil Nadu and hope for its bright future.

CEO Tarun Mishra told The Pioneer that in the absence of the chairman, all its staffers are apparently losing confidence.

Mishra also informed that the trust has enough funds and all its 83 staff members get their salaries in time, but the pace of the work is yet to pick up.

He said that earlier the WODC CEO Aswini Mishra, Kalinga Hospital director Saheb Sahu, Junagarh MLA Gobardhan Das and Berhampur Medical College principal Sunamali Bag had held a review meeting on the hospital campus for speeding up the work.

The SRMCH had signed an MOU with the State Government to complete it in a five-year period, but the period of the MoU has already elapsed.

… Under the Selvan Educational and Charitable Trust, Vadakangulam in Tamil Nadu, the SRMCH has already spent around Rs 25-30 crore and the WODC has funded Rs 9 crore for the building construction and purchase of equipment.

The hospital’s 100-bed facility was first inaugurated on December 9, 2006.

It was again inaugurated on March 18, 2007 with its 200-bed facility followed by its last inauguration of 300-bed on July 27, 2007.

Facilitated with all types of equipment, the hospital work is now being handled by three doctors only, with a medicine specialist, pediatrician and one dentist on duty.

Nearby villagers come to the hospital and take advantage of it as far as possible. It requires appointment of 12 doctors for full-fledged operation.

… The hospital has facilities of an ICU, two X-ray wards, ECG, ultra sound, 3 OTs, but due to insufficient doctors machines are hardly used.

 

The positive part is that the hospital is somewhat functional and has 300 beds and the trust has spend much more than what it received from WODC. But considering that even the private medical colleges in Bhubaneswar are running at a loss, a private medical college in Kalahandi does not have a good chance of being self-sustaining. The government needs to step in and either take over the infrastructure, add the necessary missing infrastructure and make it a government medical college OR agree to pay the full tuition (at market rates) of at least 20 students/batch for the next five years. The latter will guarantee some cash flow to the trust and perhaps make it easier for them to operate the medical college.

June 15th, 2010