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New varsity to be carved out of BU

Last Updated 24 December 2012, 20:39 IST

A new, DVG Jnanavahini University, carved out of the Bangalore University, will start functioning from the coming academic year. The State government on Monday appointed University Vishveshwaraiah College of Engineering (UVCE) principal K R Venugopal as a special officer for this new varsity. A formal notification for the new university will be issued in a month.

The proposal of bifurcating Bangalore University has been floating for nearly two years. But officials refused to name the latest move as ‘bifurcation’ and said it was ‘setting up’ a new university. However, the new move will effectively decentralise the BU administration which has been mired in controversies.

DVG Jnanavahini will have 300 colleges under its fold. Its purview will include Bangalore North Taluks, Hoskote, Devanahalli, Doddaballapur, Chickballapur and Kolar taking off a lot of pressure from the existing centralised system of administration at BU. Currently, Bangalore University has 653 colleges and 56 PG Centres under its fold. More than 3.5 lakh students are enrolled .

Appointing Venugopal as special officer, a government order was issued on Monday. He has been designated with the task of heading all preparatory works for setting up DVG Jnanavahini University until further orders.

Speaking to Deccan Herald, Minister for Higher Education C T Ravi said the university will function with effect from the academic year 2013-14.

It has been planned that the university will have its campus at Hoskote and the government has five years to establish the infrastructure. For now, its office will function from the Central College premises, Ravi said. All the 300 colleges under the university will officially be part of it from the following academic year.

In February 2011, the Higher Education Council had approved the bifurcation of Bangalore University when V S Acharya was the Higher Education Minister. The matter was placed before the state government.

A fortnight ago, Ravi had told the Legislative Council that the government would think about further dividing the university into three or four units as recommended by the former BU V-C N Rudraiah Committee.

However, this did not seem viable. “Setting up a university with minimum infrastructure will cost at least Rs 200 crore. If you are looking at a place on a par with international standards, it will cost about Rs 500 crore. Right now we do not have the finance to take up setting up of more universities as we are engaged in providing infrastructure for the existing ones,” C T Ravi said.

He added that the government would consider, in future, starting PG Centres complementing the bifurcation.

Higher Education Secretary Siddaiah saw this as a positive move towards improving BU administration. “It is a wise decision by the government. For any university, the ideal number of colleges is around 250 or 300. Beyond this, it is practically impossible to function effectively,” he said.

New principal for UVCE

Though for all practical purposes, the nomination of special officer is equal to setting up of the university, the government will issue an order in a span of a month or two stating that the university has been set up.

This will be done once the preliminary research is by the special officer is complete and a report is submitted to the government.

Meanwhile, the immediate senior professor to Venugopal will be appointed the UVCE principal.

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(Published 24 December 2012, 20:39 IST)

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