No board welcomes you to this town — only a steady flow of students in and out of local shops, restaurants and a number of yellow-coloured buses indicate you are in Manipal. What was once a barren hillock with a muddy pond is today one of India’s most preferred destination for higher education. Manipal — derived from mannu palla in Tulu, which means muddy lake — is a university town in the Udupi district of Karnataka and houses Manipal University (MU), TA Pai Management Institute, etc. Set up in 1953 by Dr TMA Pai, Manipal University has transformed the barren hillock into a lively, densely populated student town.
What strikes you hard as you climb the hill to reach Manipal, are the tall residential and commercial buildings that have come up on the town’s periphery, completely strange for a small town, except that it houses 20,000+ students annually.
Open university
One is bound to notice that nothing about Manipal shouts out, ‘here is a university town’ more than the students themselves. You rarely spot locals at the restaurants and shops. Professors and staff of Manipal University never head to the market in the evenings, as it’s filled with students. “We dare not go as we will have to wait in a queue for a table. We usually head to the club where we can easily get a table,” says Dr K Ramnarayan, vice chancellor, Manipal University.
The lack of obvious boundary walls and huge name boards, and a concerted effort towards maintaining traditional architecture across the varsity’s buildings make you feel at home, more than your peers elsewhere, at a university which has 21 constituent colleges. “Trust me, this was never in the plan. We would have loved to have barricades and a defined perimeter for the institutes. But this small town grew into a university just like that. There was no town planning back then. If Dr Pai could see the development that the university and town have made in these 58 years, he would be stunned,” says Dr Ramnarayan.
Trespassing is one thing that was not on the minds of those who created the university. Though the buildings have an e-card driven access, anyone can walk through the campuses of most colleges without being stopped — you wouldn’t know when you left the public roads and are on campus. But does the university play an active role in the town’s administration? “We do give our inputs to the administrators when we notice something or if there is any encroachment from either parties,” says Dr Ramnarayan.
Student-shop interface
A vibrant student community has naturally spawned an economy that caters to and is determined by youngsters — many eateries, grocery shops, bakeries, medical stores and even beauty parlours have set shop in Manipal. This university town has even made shopkeepers first attend to the students’ needs. For instance, a board in a tailoring shop reads, ‘Specialists in medical aprons and chudidars’!
Manipal’s main market is around Tiger Circle, named so since tigers used to frequent the place. Most shops on that circle proudly mention ‘Since 1953’, the year Dr Pai set up Kasturba Medical College, on their name boards. “When Dr Pai established KMC, he brought my father along and asked him to open a hotel for students. It was called La Shangri-la,” says Sudhakar Kini who runs a stationery shop at Tiger Circle. He is just one of the 20-odd Kinis (natives of Udupi), who run restaurants, general stores and other shops in Manipal. Kini adds, “In those days students would eat at our restaurant and leave their roll numbers with my father. At the end of the month, my father would send the credit list to the university and the bill would be deducted from the students’ college fees.” But now Kini and similar shop owners do not share such a rapport with students — Kini blames mobiles, girlfriends and more avenues for entertainment for this ‘degeneration’. “Back then, parents would entrust their children with us, they used to even transfer money to our accounts and we would in turn pass it onto students,” he recollects.
Students of Manipal swear by Dollops, a home-style restaurant which at one time used to serve the now defunct Dollops ice cream. For Ashit Amin, the owner of Dollops, everything was by chance. Though he began by selling ice creams, students requested Amin to serve sandwiches, then came burgers and the requests led him to turn his little shack into a full-fledged restaurant. Dollops has truly grown with Manipal University and its students over the last 25 years. Amin and his staff are fully aware their business depends on the students and hence share a symbiotic relationship with them. It is common to see students working on projects and even putting up art work on Dollops’ premises. “The restaurant is very supportive of our activities. Recently when we had to send out flyers, we gave the restaurant a bunch and asked them to slip in a flyer into every door-delivery package. It created quite a buzz and was very helpful,” says Surya Chandra Kambhapati, a second-year Manipal Institute of Technology student.
Manipal Bakery is another ‘since 1953’ outlet. “My father started this bakery on some land given by the Pais. Since this town has a huge number of students, they are our main customers,” says Santosh Shetty, who now runs the Bakery. He proudly narrates how many alums of Manipal University come back to the bakery and sometimes even with their children who are now students of MU.
Since the hill empties out during vacations, revenue naturally decreases for these stores. "But since business is very good during the rest of the year we are able to break-even during the lean periods,” says Asha, who manages Shanglin Chinese Beauty Parlour.
Real progress
Development can be measured on various aspects, the realty sector being one of them. The value of land in Manipal has appreciated exponentially in the last five years. Since the varsity doesn’t insist on students staying in the hostel beyond the first year, there is a huge demand for private houses. “There is a lot of scope for land to be developed in and around Manipal. The town’s outskirts have been completely developed by private builders,” says Jai Vittal, Manipal University’s estate manager. Tracking the increase in the cost of land is Jerry Vincent Dias, Udupi Builders’ Association. “The land that used to cost just `5 lakh per acre in 2004 now costs `10 crore,” he says. Dias goes on to explain that the Udupi-Manipal ‘double road’ and the `25 crore project that will shift the district offices to Manipal from Udupi are quite a draw. “In Udupi, all the offices are spread out. We will be setting up a district office complex, which will house all the departments in Manipal,” says Gokul Das Naik, commissioner, Udupi municipality. “Some 100-odd offices will be set up in addition to the Udupi RTO,” he says. Dias, a realtor himself, says that 85 per cent of his clients are NRIs. “They invest in houses, rent them out to students and hope to see the value of the flats appreciate,” he adds.
Manipal University itself owns 500 acres of 3,000 acres of the town. “We haven’t used the entire area. One-third is kept vacant and one-third is just greenery,” says Vittal. In the evenings, you will find students, faculty and locals relaxing in the greens that boasts of a walking track, football field and a great view.
Keep locals in the loop
Manipal is now synonymous with the university, and the university seems to be doing its bit to earn the locals’ goodwill. The list is endless but some initiatives standout. “The Arogya Health Card issued to locals at a token amount of Rs 100-Rs 150 provides them with a medical insurance of up to Rs 30,000,” says Prof HS Ballal, pro-chancellor. But admission will be only to general wards and not private.
Though medical tourism has not been promoted in Manipal yet, the town can be the next big destination for medical tourism in Karnataka. And as a step in that direction, the university has a special offer for all those who stay at Valley View hotel, which is a part of Welcomgroup Graduate School of Hotel Administration — the package stay includes a health check-up at Kasturba Hospital.
It’s all here
The Pai family has contributed to the growth of Udupi and Manipal in ways more than one could count. The Syndicate Bank was set up in 1925 by Upendra Ananth Pai, Vaman Kudva and Dr TMA Pai. The Pigmy Deposit scheme is a phenomenon that locals still talk about. “The bank started by collecting 2 annas daily from the doorsteps of the depositors through its agents and then in course of time gave them the returns on the interest that accumulated,” says Kini.
Manipal Technologies (earlier Manipal Press) is another such venture of the Pais which started as a single press unit with one client — the Syndicate Bank. From being a press that served only the Syndicate Bank, Manipal Technologies has grown in size to serve all banks in the country. Some say it is one of the largest press in India. From labelling, e-publishing to telecom cards and digital printing, it is a one-stop-shop for all printing solutions.
What next
The buzz that Manipal Universal Learning (MUL) has created by mulling an IPO is just an indication of how big this really is. NR Narayana Murthy’s Catamaran Venture Fund has shown inclination towards investing `200 crore in MUL. PremjiInvest, a proprietary fund of Azim Premji, had invested `200 crore in MUL last year.
One can’t help but ask the obvious question, what next? “We are planning to set up some state universities in Rajasthan, Haryana and Orissa,” says Prof Ballal. And will they be replicas of Manipal? “In due course of time we shall try to create universities on the lines of what we have here. But we must keep in mind that Dr Pai had the land, which will be difficult for us to get in other places,” he adds.
— susmita@newindianexpress.com