KOCHI : The International Education Meet (IEM) will begin here on Saturday even as several social and youth organisations have decided to hold protest marches to the venue of the meet.

R.L. Bhatia, Governor, will inaugurate the meet at Hotel Le Meridien. Education Minister E.T. Mohammed Basheer will preside over the inaugural session. Minister for Industries V.K. Ibrahim Kunju and Minister for Sports and Fisheries Dominic Presentation will also attend.

M.S. Swaminathan, Director, M.S. Swaminathan Foundation, Chennai, and Sebastian Paul, MP, will speak on the occasion. Delegates from the country and abroad will participate in the four-day event. Technical sessions on topics ranging from autonomy for educational institutions to financing of higher education will be held during the meet.

Several organisations will hold protest marches to the venue on Saturday. Representatives of social and youth organisations alleged that the Government is promoting commercialisation of the educational sector by holding the meet. The City Police have been geared up to meet any untoward incident at the inaugural session of the IEM, especially with a lot of organisations planning to demonstrate their protest. Five Assistant Commissioners — Trikkakara, Control Room, Narcotics, Crime Detachment and Armed Reserve — will be in charge of the police contingent at the venue.

Five Circle Inspectors and 20 Sub-Inspectors will be part of the team. Companies from the Armed Reserve Police will be deployed, besides plainclothesmen. Any attempt to break the law and order situation will be countered sternly, said P. Vijayan, City Police Commissioner.

The Cochin University Teachers Association (CUTA) expressed its opposition to the meet.

CUTA president K.R. Muraleedharan Nair and secretary R. Sasidharan told a press conference here on Friday that the teachers of Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT), under the banner of CUTA, would not cooperate with the conduct of the IEM in any way. The Vice-Chancellor had been informed of this decision already.

The association leaders said that their prime concern regarding the IEM was the huge expenditure that would have to be borne by the CUSAT. They pointed out that the financial situation of CUSAT had become unstable due to the implementation of many non-academic activities.

The self-drawing officers of CUSAT are being denied salary for January 2006.

CUSAT had been asked to spend the amount needed for organising the IEM from its resources, with the Government promising to recoup the funds after the meet. The expenses may be partly met by collecting registration fees from the delegates and from fee for putting up stalls for exhibitions.

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