Chair on Indian Studies in two more US Universities

Two more Chairs on Indian Studies will be set up in Brown and Pace Universities in the US with the support of Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR).
Following the signing of a MoU with Rutgers University on Contemporary Indian Studies last week, the Consulate has been reaching out to many American Universities for setting up of India Chair, Indian Consul General in New York Dnyaneshwar Mulay said here today.
India is also looking at possible tie up as knowledge partners under Prime Minister Manmohan Singh- President Barack Obama 21st Century Knowledge Initiative, he said while addressing a news conference at the Consulate General of India for the first time after taking charge.

There are over 100,000 Indian students enrolled in various courses in universities across the US spending about USD 3.5 billion in tuition and other fees.
At the same time, there are thousands of graduates who come out of Indian Universities who require skill development to prevent educated unemployed syndrome, he said.
The collaboration with American Universities will help in transfer of knowledge in the areas of skills development, training, research, faculty exchange and study abroad programmes for American students.

Besides Rutgers, Indian Chair is to be established in Pennsylvania University.
India has already set up a Law Chair in Columbia University after Dr B R Ambedkar who studied legal studies at this prestigious University.

The idea is to promote Indology and study of various aspects of India in these universities, he said.
Mulay, who was earlier India's High Commissioner in Maldives, was posted to New York in May.
He said the Indian consulate in New York has achieved the rare distinction of issuing over 100,000 visas to visit India, 80,000 Indian Passports and 30,000 Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) and Person of Indian Origin (PIO) cards to US citizens and non-resident respectively.
This is a record of sorts and tops any Indian consulates in the world in terms of providing consular services.
The Consulate has embarked on an ambitious project of total digitisation of all its records to create space to set up a library, reading room and cyber cafe to students.

It has plans to install computers with Internet facility at the consular section where people wait for services, he added.