Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

Central University still languishes without land

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Central University of Kerala, which has its seat in Kasaragod, is struggling to take off owing to delay in getting land at an appropriate location for setting up its campus and headquarters.

The sites that the State government had offered for the university were rejected outright by the panel constituted by the Union government and attempts to find an alternative location have not reached fruition despite the best efforts of the Revenue Department.

Although the Central panel had cited another site at Periya, comprising a cashew plantation owned by the Plantation Corporation, as an ideal one for setting up the university, inter-departmental differences have come in the way of the proposal.

The sites suggested by the State government were at Madikkai and Kinanur-Karinthalam. Both these sites were found unsuitable for setting up the university by the Central panel comprising the joint secretaries of the Ministry of Human Resource Development and the University Grants Commission (UGC) and the Vice-Chancellors of the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) and the Central University of Kerala.

The State government is currently trying to get the Central panel to reconsider the Kinanur-Karinthalam site, but indications are that it may be hard to convince the panel about its suitability. Revenue Minister K.P. Rajendran visited the site on Friday and held discussions with the university authorities on the subject.

The Central University of Kerala is one of the 15 universities announced by the Union government. The government had immediately announced its decision to set it up in Kasaragod. Currently, the university is functioning out of a rented building and running two courses. The university is planning to launch seven more courses next year, but is finding it difficult to create the infrastructure to house the departments. Although the Union Minister of Human Resource Development had sanctioned Rs.22 crore, the university authorities said they would be able to utilise only Rs.11 crore in the absence of the facilities.

Roughly 400 acres of land will be required for creating the campus.

The main bottleneck that the authorities face in setting up the university at Kinanur-Karinthalam is the rocky terrain and the absence of any social infrastructure. The university authorities do not wish to create laboratories and other infrastructure in rented space, but are left with few options now.

The Revenue Minister told The Hindu that a special survey team had been pressed into service to facilitate an early transfer of land to the university.

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