Friday, November 19, 2010
Friday, November 12, 2010
Amphitheatre versus hostel: Ravenshaw varsity at crossroad
Prasanna Mishra
The Ravenshaw University is popular not only among the students from Odisha, but it draws students from other States as well. The demand for hostel among the outstation students is but natural. Most outstation boys and girls come from economically not so rich family, and therefore, prefer to stay in the hostels, which are far safer and less expensive.
In 1999-2000, when the students’ strength was about 5,700, there were about 2,300 seats available in different hostels. This worked out to accommodate a respectable 40 per cent of the outstation students.
Gradually, the students’ strength rose after various self-financing courses were introduced. Now, the total student strength is around 7,800. The strength of self-financing courses has increased from less than 100 in 1999-2000 to about 2,600 in 2010-11. Unfortunately, the number of hostel seats came down to only 1,870, which are only 23 per cent of the student strength.
This situation led to congestion in the hostels and forced many students to stay in unsatisfactory, unhygienic and even more expensive places away from the university. While congestion in women’s hostels was more visible; agony of students living in miserable conditions away from hostels tended to be played down on the specious assumption that boys can easily live in adverse environment.
Such an assumption, apart from being erroneous, tends to overlook the high cost of such stay. The problem got aggravated after the decision to convert the university West Hostel into Management Centre. The hostel was renovated at a great cost. More than fifty million rupees were spent. Even now, completion of kitchen block would require more money. Meanwhile, the strength of the hostel got reduced substantially. A hostel that accommodated 250 boys has been made swanky to accommodate 130 MBA students in two-seater rooms. The rooms now provide various amenities. In any case, the hostel is no longer available to the other students of the university. The hostel is now available for both boys and girls doing Management course. The first batch of MBA students, which passed out, had perhaps no satisfactory placement in job market. It is highly unlikely that they are financially well-off by adding value to family business or have made successful startup companies. The enthusiasm for MBA course the university is offering has waned, and this year, only around 15 of the 60 seats were filled up. Some people tend to say that this dwindling interest in Ravenshaw brand is due to economic meltdown. Our Prime Minister, however, has been telling us that India has survived the meltdown and the economy is healthy. The fact is that the West Hostel is mostly unoccupied.
Though the university now permits both girls and boys in the West Hostel, the authorities are eloquent in espousing the virtue of an exclusive corridor for girls on the campus to justify their desire to convert the East Hostel into a hostel for girls. The East Hostel has an expensive amphitheatre close by. So are many offices of the university almost adjacent to this hostel. In fact, the annexe of the East Hostel that used to accommodate around 60 students has been converted into various offices. Certainly, neither the amphitheatre nor the offices are being exclusively used by girls. The concept of the corridor, therefore, does not appear to be convincing.
The problem of overcrowding of girls in some hostels can be substantially eased by transferring girls from the overcrowded hostels to the West Hostel. Even if the East Hostel is available only for girls, the hostel cannot be made habitable for them unless toilets are ready and rooms are furnished. This may take months. Then, why is the West Hostel not being used?
The Management Centre, along with students, can be accommodated in the existing commodious quarters on the campus. A period of five years is long enough to have enabled a responsive administration to create at least three hostels on the campus. Fact is that not even one hostel has been constructed. Let us see what else were constructed or renovated. The university now has an amphitheatre.
It is likely that ten million rupees could have been spent on it. Was its need more important than a hostel? The historic hall of the university was renovated certainly not to provide classrooms. We could have deferred the costly project and utilised about ten million rupees on a hostel.
The university undertook a connectivity project on the campus spending a lot of money. The project has either been abandoned or lying incomplete. By deferring this project to better times, we could have spent the money on a hostel. Did we make the FM Radio station a success? We could have saved at least five million for the hostel. We could have negotiated with the service providers for the self-financing courses and enhanced the university’s share of income.
The decision to covert the West Hostel to the Management Centre in the context of prevailing acute shortage of hostel accommodation was certainly avoidable. More than fifty million rupees spent on renovation –still incomplete—could have been utilised for new hostels. Now, a word about the quality of instructors of self-financing courses would be relevant. The university has a respectable strength of students, around 2,600, studying in various self-financing disciplines. Who are the teachers? Do they have the same qualifications that apply to teachers of the university? Has the university any overriding arrangement with the service providers by which a person not adequately qualified can be prevented from teaching the students? Is the university bound to engage the same service providers till eternity? These are issues the Government should have a look at as it involves quality of education of thousands of boys and girls who are paying for the courses.
Some persons seem to have been appointed against positions/posts that do not exist. One such case relates to appointment as Director, Ravenshaw Knowledge Centre, on contract with a consolidated pay of Rs 65,000 per month. Who else in this State’s Government system has made such an appointment? In the State Government there are precedents when senior servants have been removed from service for having irregularly appointed class IV employees even while such posts existed. Here are cases where posts did not exist; persons are engaged and paid fancy salary. Don’t we swear by equality of treatment? All I am pleading for here is aimed towards upholding the majesty and dignity of my alma mater, a veritable Methuselah among premier educational institutions of the country, and a bright future of the young students.
--The writer, a former civil servant, can be reached at punarbashu@gmail.com
The Ravenshaw University is popular not only among the students from Odisha, but it draws students from other States as well. The demand for hostel among the outstation students is but natural. Most outstation boys and girls come from economically not so rich family, and therefore, prefer to stay in the hostels, which are far safer and less expensive.
In 1999-2000, when the students’ strength was about 5,700, there were about 2,300 seats available in different hostels. This worked out to accommodate a respectable 40 per cent of the outstation students.
Gradually, the students’ strength rose after various self-financing courses were introduced. Now, the total student strength is around 7,800. The strength of self-financing courses has increased from less than 100 in 1999-2000 to about 2,600 in 2010-11. Unfortunately, the number of hostel seats came down to only 1,870, which are only 23 per cent of the student strength.
This situation led to congestion in the hostels and forced many students to stay in unsatisfactory, unhygienic and even more expensive places away from the university. While congestion in women’s hostels was more visible; agony of students living in miserable conditions away from hostels tended to be played down on the specious assumption that boys can easily live in adverse environment.
Such an assumption, apart from being erroneous, tends to overlook the high cost of such stay. The problem got aggravated after the decision to convert the university West Hostel into Management Centre. The hostel was renovated at a great cost. More than fifty million rupees were spent. Even now, completion of kitchen block would require more money. Meanwhile, the strength of the hostel got reduced substantially. A hostel that accommodated 250 boys has been made swanky to accommodate 130 MBA students in two-seater rooms. The rooms now provide various amenities. In any case, the hostel is no longer available to the other students of the university. The hostel is now available for both boys and girls doing Management course. The first batch of MBA students, which passed out, had perhaps no satisfactory placement in job market. It is highly unlikely that they are financially well-off by adding value to family business or have made successful startup companies. The enthusiasm for MBA course the university is offering has waned, and this year, only around 15 of the 60 seats were filled up. Some people tend to say that this dwindling interest in Ravenshaw brand is due to economic meltdown. Our Prime Minister, however, has been telling us that India has survived the meltdown and the economy is healthy. The fact is that the West Hostel is mostly unoccupied.
Though the university now permits both girls and boys in the West Hostel, the authorities are eloquent in espousing the virtue of an exclusive corridor for girls on the campus to justify their desire to convert the East Hostel into a hostel for girls. The East Hostel has an expensive amphitheatre close by. So are many offices of the university almost adjacent to this hostel. In fact, the annexe of the East Hostel that used to accommodate around 60 students has been converted into various offices. Certainly, neither the amphitheatre nor the offices are being exclusively used by girls. The concept of the corridor, therefore, does not appear to be convincing.
The problem of overcrowding of girls in some hostels can be substantially eased by transferring girls from the overcrowded hostels to the West Hostel. Even if the East Hostel is available only for girls, the hostel cannot be made habitable for them unless toilets are ready and rooms are furnished. This may take months. Then, why is the West Hostel not being used?
The Management Centre, along with students, can be accommodated in the existing commodious quarters on the campus. A period of five years is long enough to have enabled a responsive administration to create at least three hostels on the campus. Fact is that not even one hostel has been constructed. Let us see what else were constructed or renovated. The university now has an amphitheatre.
It is likely that ten million rupees could have been spent on it. Was its need more important than a hostel? The historic hall of the university was renovated certainly not to provide classrooms. We could have deferred the costly project and utilised about ten million rupees on a hostel.
The university undertook a connectivity project on the campus spending a lot of money. The project has either been abandoned or lying incomplete. By deferring this project to better times, we could have spent the money on a hostel. Did we make the FM Radio station a success? We could have saved at least five million for the hostel. We could have negotiated with the service providers for the self-financing courses and enhanced the university’s share of income.
The decision to covert the West Hostel to the Management Centre in the context of prevailing acute shortage of hostel accommodation was certainly avoidable. More than fifty million rupees spent on renovation –still incomplete—could have been utilised for new hostels. Now, a word about the quality of instructors of self-financing courses would be relevant. The university has a respectable strength of students, around 2,600, studying in various self-financing disciplines. Who are the teachers? Do they have the same qualifications that apply to teachers of the university? Has the university any overriding arrangement with the service providers by which a person not adequately qualified can be prevented from teaching the students? Is the university bound to engage the same service providers till eternity? These are issues the Government should have a look at as it involves quality of education of thousands of boys and girls who are paying for the courses.
Some persons seem to have been appointed against positions/posts that do not exist. One such case relates to appointment as Director, Ravenshaw Knowledge Centre, on contract with a consolidated pay of Rs 65,000 per month. Who else in this State’s Government system has made such an appointment? In the State Government there are precedents when senior servants have been removed from service for having irregularly appointed class IV employees even while such posts existed. Here are cases where posts did not exist; persons are engaged and paid fancy salary. Don’t we swear by equality of treatment? All I am pleading for here is aimed towards upholding the majesty and dignity of my alma mater, a veritable Methuselah among premier educational institutions of the country, and a bright future of the young students.
--The writer, a former civil servant, can be reached at punarbashu@gmail.com
Friday, October 22, 2010
Ravenshaw University is about intellect, not gimmickry
October 23, 2010 10:42:06 AM
PRASANNA MISHRA
October 23, 2010 10:42:06 AM
PRASANNA MISHRA
Dr Pranakrushna Parija was the Vice-Chancellor of the Utkal University in 1965 when I joined the university as an Assistant Professor in the postgraduate Department of Political Science. A few months later, in the IAS interview, I found Dr Parija as a member of the panel of eminent people assessing the candidates of the day. His erudition was known far and wide. He had been the president of the Indian Science Congress in 1960, had a Tripos in Natural Sciences in 1916 and a Tripos, part II in Botany from the Cambridge University. He was the first Indian to be elected a scholar of Christ’s College, Cambridge in 1918. On Dr Parija’s passing away, Chief Minister Nilamani Routray made a historic decision. The National Flag flew at half mast.
Those were the days I recount today to highlight how there has been a steady plummeting of the value-system over the years, culminating in the desecration of the statue of this very illustrious son of Odisha. Dr Parija had spent years in the Ravenshaw College after joining the Indian Educational Service in 1921. That this shameful incident was viewed with equanimity in the city of Cuttack speaks volumes on the growing insensitivity of our society. No wonder, such an act has gone unpunished. Could statues of Gopabandhu and Madhusudan, missing from the campus of the university, also have met with similar treatment?
I had a short stay of about ten months in the university. The Department of Political Science was a large one with over 200. Many of them have occupied positions of eminence in our society. Four of them became Vice-Chancellors in different universities of the State. The Ravenshaw College got converted to a university. I viewed this development as a loud statement of the Government that mushrooming of universities is in tune with the prevailing widespread disorder in the education sector.
The Ravenshaw College had been at the forefront of quality education in the country for over a century. For thousands of people, the college has been the alma mater for generations. My grandfather and my father were students in the college. So was I, for four years. I lived those years in the East Hostel where I was also the editor of the hostel magazine for some time. Today, unfortunately, peace and tranquility in the campus of the hostel seem to have been disturbed. I also feel that the unique university which should blossom into one of the most sought-after temples of learning has faltered. The various schools the existing teaching departments have been brought under should have introduced courses on new related subjects. For example, the schools dealing with science could have introduced subjects like microbiology; molecular biology; bioinformatics; marine biology; Nano technology; biophysics; biochemistry and geophysics. It is a matter of concern that even syllabus of the existing subjects is not being updated to keep pace with the new developments in the area of study. I am sure none would like the university to be just “another” institute. It was therefore perhaps not desirable to have gone in for courses on BBA, MBA and hotel management. Since there are well-established premier institutes in the country for such areas, the Ravenshaw University would always remain a second or third grade institution for such courses. Teaching subjects like BBA; MCA; MA (Journalism) by outsourcing teaching staff is another area of concern. This arrangement affords little say to the university on the calibre of the teaching staff engaged by the outside agency.
The university is yet to make its statute. As a result, academic bodies like Academic Council and Board of Studies would not be able to function well. Arrangements for research activities in science streams are almost nonexistent. The old laboratories of the erstwhile college are languishing without worthwhile development. The library is being poorly maintained. A music section has been created in place of the journal section. The university is in urgent need of more hostels; class rooms, library and laboratories. There is need for economy on expenditure on beautification; remodelling, TA, telephones, seminars, etc. The front portion of the historic building is now poised to be converted into a museum where for years eminent professors were teaching students.
The West Hostel is now only for MBA students.
While the principal of the erstwhile college was having assistance of only one stenographer, the number of personal staff for the Vice-Chancellor seems to have increased manifold .Besides the stenographer, there are now a Special Assistant, an Executive Secretary, a Public Relations Officer, a Photographer and a Development Officer. Most of these functionaries are not against any sanctioned posts. How they are being paid salary needs looking into. Such arrangement does not seem to be in tune with existing policy of the Government.
Where is the university headed? Is it striving towards excellence in the academic arena? Is it promoting research activities? Is it conducting meaningful tutorials? It may be worthwhile to mention a few specialities of the Cambridge University. I quote “The principal method of teaching at Cambridge colleges is the supervision. These are typically weekly hour-long sessions in which small groups of students, usually between one and three, meet with a member of the university’s teaching staff or a doctoral student. Students are normally required to complete an essay or assignment in advance of the supervision, which they would discuss with the supervisor during the session along with any concerns or difficulties they have had with the material presented in that week’s lectures. Lectures at Cambridge are often described as being almost a mere ‘bolt-on’ to these supervisions. Students receive between one and three supervisions per week, depending upon their subjects. This pedagogical system is often cited as being unique to Cambridge and Oxford (where “supervisions” are known as “tutorials”). Cambridge produces more PhDs per year than any other British university. In 2006, a study showed that Cambridge has the highest research paper output of any British university. The university is also closely linked with development of the high-tech business cluster in and around Cambridge, which forms the area known as Silicon Fen. In 2004, Silicon Fen was the second largest venture-capital market in the world.
The Ravenshaw University has been in existence for some years. It should have incorporated a few best practices of the best universities of the world. I would like to believe that the university is about intellect; not gimmickry.
-- The writer is a former civil servant. He can be reached at punarbashu@gmail.com
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Hai Pranakrushna!
Hai Pranakrushna!
Sadly, this is the way how the VC wants to metamorphose Ravenshaw into a Harvard or Cambridge, which he claims to be doing all these days.
History repeats itself. This reminds us of the horrendous scenario during Medieval India when Mughal kings invaded India by demolishing temples. This modern day Mughal king is exactly doing the same thing with this great temple of learning.
Invading a temple of learning the Moghul way
This statute of Dr. Pranakrushna Parija was installed at the main entrance of Ravenshaw College in 1988, on the occasion of 10th death anniversary of eminent writer, educationist, administrator and scientist of international repute, Prof. Parija who brought immense glory to the college at the international level.
But shockingly, this very statue has been uprooted and devastated by the present authority (Hon’ble VC Mr. Devdas Chhotray, IAS) and has been thrown to a dingy corner of the institution where phenyl bottles, latrine buckets and brooms for cleaning toilets are kept alongside. Both the statue and the marble inscription are now fractured and broken as a result of gross mishandling and hurling. This statue was once standing tall in front of the main entrance (see attached pic Ravenshaw.jpg to know the earlier location of the statue). It was a great source of inspiration for both students and teachers. In many foreign universities including Harvard and Cambridge (see pics), statutes of such great personalities who either studied or taught there (from Einstein to Gagarin), still stand tall, and highly venerated by all. Even there is a custom among generations of students in some universities to kiss the statues of these great personalities after completing their studies.
But shockingly, this very statue has been uprooted and devastated by the present authority (Hon’ble VC Mr. Devdas Chhotray, IAS) and has been thrown to a dingy corner of the institution where phenyl bottles, latrine buckets and brooms for cleaning toilets are kept alongside. Both the statue and the marble inscription are now fractured and broken as a result of gross mishandling and hurling. This statue was once standing tall in front of the main entrance (see attached pic Ravenshaw.jpg to know the earlier location of the statue). It was a great source of inspiration for both students and teachers. In many foreign universities including Harvard and Cambridge (see pics), statutes of such great personalities who either studied or taught there (from Einstein to Gagarin), still stand tall, and highly venerated by all. Even there is a custom among generations of students in some universities to kiss the statues of these great personalities after completing their studies.
Sadly, this is the way how the VC wants to metamorphose Ravenshaw into a Harvard or Cambridge, which he claims to be doing all these days.
History repeats itself. This reminds us of the horrendous scenario during Medieval India when Mughal kings invaded India by demolishing temples. This modern day Mughal king is exactly doing the same thing with this great temple of learning.
Hai Pranakrushna!
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Saturday, September 25, 2010
It is now enough let us arise, awake and stop this mindless vandalism
Enough is enough... Now time has come to arise, awake and put a full-stop to these mindless vandalism. Let us come out from the shut doors and say ....Let us come out and be united and speak against injustice .......let truth prevail..
Friday, September 24, 2010
Breaking News: Authority threatens students to fail them in exam if they stay in East Hostel also beaten them using anti-socials
Till now students are not got admission into hostel....
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Read everything in detail in "News & Views"......
Read the latest article published in "Saptahika Niankhunta" placed under 'News and Views' section
The article unveiled truth very boldly which left all concerned bewildered...Article was published on September 20.
Monday, September 13, 2010
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