8 August : With the implementation of OBC quota in higher educational institutions, the intake of students in various central educational institutions has shot up by 20,500 this academic year.
"As a result of the implementation of OBC reservations in this academic year, there is an increase of over 20,500 in the intake capacity in the central educational institutions," a high-level meeting said on Friday.
All the IITs, IIMs and central universities have started giving reservations to OBCs in a staggered manner and necessary funds have been released to all the institutions, the meeting chaired by the Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister was told.
The meeting reviewed the status of the Prime Minister’s initiatives on higher education.The government was working on an Education Loan Interest Subsidy Scheme.
It would be a Central Sector scheme for providing interest subsidy during the moratorium period on the educational loans taken by students belonging to ‘non-creamy’ layer for pursuing professional education, a PMO release said.
Besides, scholarships for college and university students, based on merit, to non-creamy layer students numbering about two per cent of the student population would be given to those who pass out from various intermediate boards.
The scholarship would be Rs 1,000 per month for the first two years after which it would be Rs 2,000 per month for the remaining period of the professional or other courses in higher education.
Nearly 82,000 boys and girls would benefit from the scheme, it said.
The initiative to set up eight new IITs was on course with the first academic sessions starting this year in six of the new IITs in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Orissa, Punjab and Gujarat, the release said.
While the session for IIT Orissa has been started at IIT Kharagpur in July this year, classes would begin for IIT Punjab at IIT Delhi in September this year, the PMO release said adding the academic session for the other four new IITs would begin this month.
Out of the seven new IIMs proposes, IIM at Shillong has already commenced its first academic session from last month.
The remaining six IIMs would be established in Jharkhand, Chattisgarh, Uttarakhand, Jammu and Kashmir, Tamil Nadu and Haryana.
On the proposal to set up five Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER), two IISERs at Pune and Kolkata were now fully functional and IISER, Mohali, has started its first academic session in 2007/08.
Two more IISERs in Bhopal and Thiruvanthapuram would commence their first academic sessions this month, the release said.
Two Schools of Planning and Architecture (SPAs) were being set up in Bhopal and Vijayawada and the academic session in these institutions would begin in temporary campuses.
The SPA Bhopal would be mentored by NIT Bhopal while the SPA at Vijayawada would be mentored by SPA Delhi.
The strengthening of polytechnics was under way with steps being taken to set up 1,000 polytechnics (300 in government sector, 300 through PPP mode and 400 in private sector), the release said.
Besides, 500 existing polytechnics were being expanded and the community polytechnics were being revamped and their number increased from 669 to 1,000, it said.
Steps were being taken to set up 10 new National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and the likely location of these institutions would be in states and union territories which at present did not have an NIT.
Sagar University in Madhya Pradesh, Bilaspur University in Chhattisgarh, Garhwal University in Uttarakhand and Goa University were proposed to be taken over and upgraded as Central Universities.
Twelve new Central universities were to be set up in Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
At least 14 world class Central Universities were proposed with the locations being firmed up in consultation with the Planning Commission.
The state governments have been asked to identity suitable land, the release said.
While 20 Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIIT) were planned with NAASCOM having submitted its project report, a total of 373 degree colleges would be set up in various districts, it added.