The annual budget of the Mahatma Gandhi University for the year 2012-13 will focus on ensuring the inclusive and qualitative expansion of higher education.
In his introductory address prior to the Budget speech, Vice Chancellor Rajan Gurukkal stressed on the need for the University’s Annual Financial Plan to draw schemes for infrastructural growth with better facilities and equitable access for all sections of the clientele, particularly the weak and the marginalised.
“The first initiative in the direction of inclusion is to provide for in the Annual Plan financial provision of the academic rehabilitation of the SC/ST drop-outs from professional colleges. The University has already initiated certain preliminaries for implementing a special scheme, namely Professional Education Completion Scheme (PECS) for the remedial assistance to the SC/ST drop-outs of engineering colleges. The scheme is visualised to have three components: the instructional remedial component, administrative remedial component, and occupational remedial component. The first component will have academic arrangements for special instructional support and laboratory/workshop support at the institutional level with the service of voluntary mentor teachers including retired hands. The administrative remedial component will include adoption of new regulations and norms appropriate for remedying the varied issues concerned of the drop-outs. The occupational remedial component includes measures of rehabilitation,” he said.
The other academic initiatives that have been proposed in the Budget include establishing the National Institute of Plant Science and Technology, the Advanced Molecular Materials Research Centre, an Inter University Centre for Women Studies and Empowerment, an Inter University Centre for Public Administration and Social Justice and the Dr. Ambedkar Centre for Constitutional Law and Parliamentary Affairs.
As part of the academic research initiatives, the incentives will now onwards be provided for obtaining patents, and publication paper and original books. Any teacher of the University, who has obtained a patent, is eligible for this incentive per patent. Amounts of Rs. 50,000 and Rs. 1,00,000 each will be given as incentives for obtaining Indian patents and International/U.S. patents.
The budget also proposed to provide an incentive of Rs. 25,000 each for every paper that is produced or published in a world-class referred journal. Moreover, any teacher who has published books with original contents will be eligible for an incentive of Rs. 2 lakh each. Amounts of Rs. 10 lakh each have been earmarked in the Budget for the three categories of incentives.
The University will also establish a C.H. Muhammed Koya Chair and a G. Sankara Kurup Chair under the School of Letters.
The University Industry Interface programme will be introduced in which technical support would be extended towards the R&D departments of various industry players. This would benefit the University as a fund-generating option, according to C.I. Abdul Rahiman, Convener, Syndicate Sub-Committee of Finance, who had presented the Budget.
The infrastructural development projects that have been proposed include the launch of the second phase construction of the Silver Jubilee Pareeksha Bhavan, and the construction of Syndicate House, Convergence Academic Complex, Professors quarters, Vice-Chancellor/Pro-Vice Chancellor’s bungalow, and the Students and Employees Recreation Centre.
