Government to Review Land Norm for Institutes

BENGALURU: like Indian Institutes of Management (IIM), Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) and central universities.

The ministry has constituted an expert committee to discuss the issue and make recommendations. The committee is headed by Sathyanarayan Mohanty, higher education secretary at the Centre, and held its first meeting on December 8, 2014.

Most members said that 80 to 100 acres are enough to establish such institutions. Sathyanarayan Mohanty said, “There is an urgency to re-assess the requirement of land to establish central educational institutions in view of the fact that there is scarcity of land in the country.”

The committee suggested getting the opinion of Infosys, which has set up excellent campuses with good architectural design. However, it decided to have a final round of meeting before submitting its recommendations to the government.

Currently, the land requirement is around 100 to 200 acres for IIMs, 300 acres for national institutes of technology and 500 acres for IITs and central universities. An internal assessment by the ministry had found that the land requirement could be much less.

Decisions at the Meeting

  • Committee to interact with Hafeez Contractor, one of the renowned architects in the country
  • lnfosys will also be consulted to learn from the design of its campuses
  • Air connectivity should be a priority. The location should be no farther than a 30- to 40-minute drive from the nearest airport.
  • A template for common facilities such as library, gym, auditorium, academic resources etc. should be designed, keeping in view the current students’ enrolment and future growth.
  • The School of Planning and Architecture may also be asked to participate in the next meeting for technical inputs, and data from IITs, IIMs, central universities and NITs should be collected.

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