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| IIMs, IITs lease flats to accommodate quota students |
| Kalpana Pathak & Vinay Umarji / Mumbai/Ahmedabad Mar 30, 2009, 00:15 IST |
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IIMs implement quotas in four categories: OBC 27 per cent, SC 15 per cent, ST 7.5 per cent and handicapped 3 per cent.
With their campuses already overflowing, the premier institutes of technology and management -— Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) -— are renting out properties outside their campus to expand capacity in a bid to implement the increased quota requirements this academic year.
IIM-Calcutta (IIM-C) has spent a few crores buying around 10 flats outside its campus where it would be accommodating participants of the executive education programme. “We prefer accommodating the students of the flagship management programme on campus as they would require long study and working hours. Students in other programmes can be accommodated outside campus,” said professor Saibal Chatopadhyay, IIM Calcutta.
IIM-C says it is in discussion with developers to provide the institute with room on long lease for around six to nine months. The institute will be accommodating around 90 extra students this year taking the total student strength to 408 from 318 last academic year.
With its campus in Bannerghatta already brimming, IIM-Bangalore has decided to take 50 apartments (150 rooms) on lease in a nearby residential building called Ajmera Complex. The plan is to lodge students from the one-year full time Executive Post Graduate Programme in Management — to be launched in April — in the leased apartments.
Pankaj Chandra, director, IIM Bangalore said: “The institute had received Rs 29 crore from the human resources development ministry for the OBC quota expansion, but the overall expenses of accommodating new faculty and students is expected to be much higher than that.”
In its recent report, the IIM Review Committee - led by Maruti Suzuki India chairman RC Bhargava - suggested that IIM faculty and administrative staff residences could be moved to off-campus sites, and accommodation bought/rented there so that "the existing infrastructure could be more intensively used".
At present, IIMs implement, quota in four categories-- OBC 27 per cent, SC 15 per cent, ST 7.5 per cent and handicapped 3 per cent.
The Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur (IIT-K) is looking out for reasonable deals too. "We are in talks with brokers for suitable deals for renting out properties so that we can shift some of our student accomodation outside the campus," said S G Dande, director, IIT-K. The institute is doubling its seats by adding another 120 this year.
IIT Delhi on the other hand is planning to manage expansion on the campus itself. The institute is awaiting grant of Rs 100 crore from the Ministry of Human Resource and Development (MHRD) to go ahead with its plans. "We will manage expansion within the campus as there are hardly any properties available for rent in the proximity of the campus. We are awaiting the grant from MHRD to go ahead with the plans,” said Surendra Prasad, director of IIT-D.
IIT Delhi is set to expand number of seats by 30 per cent as against 11 per cent last year. It would be increasing the total number of students in under-graduate and post-graduate programme to 1,400 from current 1,250.
IIM-Ahmedabad (IIM-A), on the other hand, is planning to use its management development centres (MDCs) and faculty houses to accommodate new students on campus.
"We have 234 rooms in MDC, of which 64 rooms are supposed to be double seater but are used as single seaters during training programs. We also have 170-odd single seater rooms. We have some faculty houses and other properties available within the campus, which can be used in the interim period. Since the entire 54 per cent expansion will not happen till 2011, we can buy some time in the intertwining period by using these properties till new buildings are constructed for the students," said Samir Barua, director, IIM-A.
Having implemented 12 per cent of expansion of seats, IIM-A will take up 26 per cent this academic year, including 13 per cent of other backward class (OBC) quota, and will look at implementing 54 per cent in all of its five major programmes by 2010-11.
“If required we may ask students to double up their rooms. This way we will not have to shift our students outside the campus unlike other institutes," said Barua.
Barua added that the institute is also mulling to use its for student accomodation. The institute had asked the government for a fund of Rs 54 crore while the government has agreed to give only Rs 34 crore of which IIM-A has received Rs 2 crore only so far.
The Sixth Pay Commission recommendations, which will also lay an additional burden of Rs 7-8 crore on the institute towards faculty salaries, which has also been a cause of worry for IIM-A.
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