Thapar University to set up two campuses

Patiala-based Thapar University (formerly Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology) plans to set up two campuses over the next five years — one on a 14-acre campus near Chandigarh by 2010, and another in Chhattisgarh.

It plans to offer courses in management and engineering at its proposed Chandigarh campus and will invest around Rs 30-35 crore.

The existing 250-acre campus in Patiala has a student strength of 4,600 and can accommodate around 6,000 students, according to Abhijit Mukherjee, director, Thapar University.

“The initial student strength at the new campus would be 200 but would go up to 2,000 eventually. Also, we will need 15-20 faculty members for the Chandigarh campus. The Patiala campus’ management school will be shifted to Chandigarh and the existing engineering courses will also be expanded. As of now, there are 300 students in management and 3,000 in engineering,” said Mukherjee.

As for a campus in central India, Thapar University has been invited by the government of Chhattisgarh to set up a large campus with residential facilities like the Patiala one .

The university is also keen on introducing new inter-disciplinary courses. Recently, it added courses in biology and biotechnology.

On the foreign-alliances front, it already has a tie-up with the University of Waterloo in Canada, Western Ontario and Virginia Tech, and is in talks with more institutes to have exchange programmes and research collaboration.