The Hindu : New Delhi News : Jamia to set up research centre in Afghanistan

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Wednesday, Aug 29, 2007
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New Delhi

Jamia to set up research centre in Afghanistan

Parul Sharma

NEW DELHI: Indian academia could soon pursue joint research activities in peace building with their counterparts in war-torn Afghanistan that is currently on the road to recovery.

Nelson Mandela Centre for Peace and Conflict Resolution at Jamia Millia Islamia here is working out the modalities for signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the Regional Studies Centre of Afghanistan at Kabul, the first and only research centre of regional affairs in that country to disseminate and advance knowledge.

“We have sent the Centre a draft of the Memorandum of Understanding. Our work will be done in a week’s time, but there are certain procedures to be followed at their end. And of course a lot depends on funding,” said Director of the Nelson Mandela Centre Radha Kumar.

Both the institutions will evolve a schedule to develop programmes, hold seminars and exchange visits. The academic interaction and intellectual assimilation will include faculty or staff exchange, exchange of students, organising seminars, research, conferences and workshops. The two will also seek to form collaborations in the sharing of academic data, scientific information, intellectual property, articles and publications.

“We spent time with the Director of that Centre, Ghafoor Liwal, and proposed such a collaboration where we can have research on peace building. Their fellows can come and study here, our Ph. D. students can go there. We are also looking at faculty exchange. They can access our books and journals and we will get to know more about Afghanistan and its position in South Asia considering that it has now joined South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation. We can have short-term courses as well,” Prof. Kumar pointed out.

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