It's a long way for new B'lore North and Central varsities

The newly created Bangalore North and Central Universities, which officially began operations on July 1, have a long way to go before they can function as independent and full-fledged institutions.

After the official trifurcation,  BU (North) will function from the existing PG Centre in Kolar and BU (Central) from the Central College campus, Palace Road.  A new campus will be set up for BU (North) in Jangamakote, Kolar.

“The government has initiated the process of identifying vice chancellors and other statutory officers such as registrars and finance officers, for the new varsities. Both universities have to set up academic councils, a syndicate, board of examiners, board of studies, etc,” an official involved in the trifurcation said.

In the academic year 2017-18, admission will be conducted through the parent university and the list of students will be later transferred to the jurisdictional universities.

Of over 1,400 non-teaching vacancies in the Bangalore University, 100 each are being transferred to the two new varsities. “The vacancies include the posts of assistant registrar, computer operators and drivers.The government will be requested to sanction more number of posts as and when the individual universities require,” said another official, who sought anonymity.

The official said the administrative set-up would be ready in two months. “The new universities will also have to prepare to open new departments from the next academic year. At present, BU (North) has Kannada, Economics, Social Work and Botany departments, while BU (Central) has Commerce, Management, Communication, Mathematics, Chemistry and Biochemistry departments.”

The parent university will be paying the new universities in installments as recommended by the government - Rs 10 crore to BU (Central) and Rs 15 crore to BU (North). BU has already given the seed amount of Rs 3 crore to BU (Central) and Rs one crore to BU (North) from its corpus fund of Rs 21 crore.

Another Rs 2 crore will be released to the North university shortly.

University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering (UVCE) will be under the Bangalore University. However, no decision has been taken about shifting the campus to Jnanabharathi.

“If it is to be shifted, necessary infrastructure such as hostels and labs will have to be set up. We will have further discussions on this,’ said Dr M Muniraju, vice-chancellor (in-charge), at a press conference on Saturday.