The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Varsity holding up library modernisation project

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Wednesday, Jan 23, 2008
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Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Varsity holding up library modernisation project

G. Mahadevan

Three MoUs to be signed to get going

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Administrative potholes in the University of Kerala appear to have taken the momentum out of a Rs.3-crore development project for the University Library even though it has been ten months since the varsity received the money from the State government.

Among other things, the fund was to be utilised for construction — civil and electrical — in the library and for digitisation of selected documents in the Kerala Studies section. The fund was transferred to the university on March 31, 2007, based on a modernisation project submitted to the government by the deputy librarian-in-charge of the library.

The project was drawn up in early 2007 after Finance Minister T.M. Thomas Isaac visited the library and offered money for developmental activities there. It was perhaps for the first time in the history of the library that the government had handed over funds with such promptness for a developmental scheme. Mr. Isaac also promised more funds for the library if and when required.

Once the university received the money, the Library and Publications Committee of the syndicate decided to set up an expert committee to draw up plans to spend the money. This was done ostensibly because the proposal submitted by the deputy librarian-in-charge was “sketchy.” The original nine-member committee was “upgraded” to a 13-member committee. There were many in the university library and in the university administration who feared that these moves would only serve to delay the implementation of the project. Their fears now seem to be coming true.

After many meetings and much debate, the expert committee identified three agencies to carry out various works listed in the library development project proposal. While the digitisation work is to be done by the Centre for Development of Imaging Technology (CDIT), the Kumar Group is to be the consultants for civil and electrical work. The task of installing solar lighting equipment in the library is to be handled by the Hykon group.

The university now needs to sign memoranda of understanding with these three agencies to get the development project going. According to sources in the expert committee, the Kumar Group has handed over the plan for its share of the project-related work. “Now the university has to sign the MoU. Then Kumar Group will submit the work estimates. But here is the hitch. The MoU is yet to reach the university’s legal wing which has to approve it,” an expert committee member told The Hindu.

The file pertaining to the modernisation scheme has reportedly been at the office of the Director, Planning, of the university for the past two months. According to university officials, including Vice-Chancellor M.K. Ramachandran Nair who spoke to The Hindu on this issue, claimed that “acute staff shortage” was the real culprit behind the delay in the implementation of the library modernisation scheme.

“A couple of days ago, a delegation from the library met the Vice-Chancellor and urged him to expedite the modernisation scheme. He agreed to do the needful,” a library official said. Now, it is not clear whether the same “acute staff shortage” will hold this file up at the legal wing too. The timely completion of this project assumes added significance as the university is only a few months shy of being re-accredited by the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) of the University Grants Commission.

The fact that the university was given money so promptly by the government has actually left some in the library, in the university administration, and in the expert committee worried.

The perpetually cash-strapped university would find an unused Rs.3 crore too much of a temptation to resist, they reason. They find small comfort in the assurance reportedly given to them by the university’s finance officer that this money has not been deposited in the varsity’s general fund. Dr. Ramachandran Nair too has, time and again, stated that this fund would not be diverted.

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