Modi breaks impasse over university land

Feb 11, 2012 - Nitin Mahajan |

Age Correspondent

New Delhi

Despite being the Centre’s favourite punching bag, it was Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, whose intervention has finally managed to break an almost two-year-old impasse over allotment of lands between Sharad Pawar-led agriculture ministry and Kapil Sibal-led HRD ministry in Gujarat.

It took Mr Modi to persuade the agriculture minister to swap the land allotted to his ministry with the HRD ministry, for setting up of a Central university. The state administration had allotted 250 acres of land each to agriculture ministry in Gandhinagar and in Navsari district to the HRD ministry.
The agriculture ministry is understood to have promptly constructed its research institute on the Gandhinagar land, while the HRD refused to build its Central university as it didn’t like the location, since it was not well connected for a central university. Following Mr Modi’s persuasive skills, Mr Pawar has finally decided to hand over the land and building to HRD for an amount of Rs 85 lakhs, which HRD minister Kapil Sibal has agreed to pay. NCP chief Pawar has agreed to shift his agriculture research institute, currently located in Gandhinagar to a location in Navsari district, effectively paving way for the establishment of the Central university in the state. The HRD ministry didn’t earlier agree to establish a Central university on the land allocated to it as was felt that the district didn’t have proper air and rail connectivity and demanded land near Gandhinagar.
The decision comes as a major relief for Gujarat as the University didn’t have a campus despite being established by Parliament way back in March 2009. The establishment of a Central university in the state was part an ambitious scheme by the UPA government to add over 30,000 seats in higher education.

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