DAVANAGERE: CIRCA 2007, it was a rosy picture when the then JD(S)-BJP dispensation allocated seven first grade degree colleges that includes a separate degree college for women for Davanagere district.
According to Gangadharaiah joint director of collegiate education- stationed at Shimoga, the seven colleges sanctioned were at Davanagere, Harihar, Harapanahalli, Jagalur, Honnali, Basavapattna and Santhebennur in Chennagiri taluks.
This common knowledge apart it’s only when Gangadharaiah further spoke that the skeletons started tumbling out. In Davanagere the land was available for the degree college for women and the building work had begun for the college, similarly in Harihar, Harapanahalli and at Jagalur the land was available for the college buildings. However, in Santhebennur, Basavapattna and at Honnali the availability of land had turned out to be a touchy issue.
With the land being available ten kilometres from human civilisation it would have been a Sisyphean task for the students to traverse the entire way. The then chief minister and current JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswamy had sanctioned 15 posts of teaching and non teaching staff posts at the time of sanction of degree college and also it had allocated grants ranging from Rs.50 lakh to one crore for each college as basic infrastructure and building grants. This, Gangadhariah pointed out, was first-of-its-kind in the state and the grants were sanctioned with the help of NABARD.
In Basavapatna the first grade college with over 150 students strength was running in an old government primary school building since the last two years. In five rooms the classes are conducted and the parttime lecturers who work in government junior college are taking classes.
The junior college lecturers who take classes for sociology, commerce, Kannada and other subjects in arts are taking classes for degree students also said Somashekarappa, principal of the government junior college.
In Santhebennur the degree college was running in government middle school building and the students are lectured by part-time lecturers.
In Davanagere the degree college has own building and a separate women degree college was also coming up as the guddali pooja for the building was done recently.
With status quo as fragile as a soap bubble these colleges demand attention.