KOZHIKODE: Two of Kerala’s premier educational institutions — the National Institute of Technology-Calicut (NIT-C) and the Indian Institute of Management-Kozhikode (IIM-K) — are in the midst of a tricky situation. The state government, which took over some hostels of the institutions to run Covid care centres back in April, are refusing to move out even as NIT-C is expected to commence its classes soon while IIM-K is worried that big multinational companies may stay away from campus recruitment this season due to the fear of Covid-19 spread.
It’s tricky because the institutions fear that their objections could be interpreted as their lack of commitment towards a social cause, though the fact remains that things have moved far from the initial stages of the pandemic and now hardly any patient goes into institutional quarantine.
After taking over a 200-room hostel having a two-bed facility in April, the Kozhikode administration got hold of another 370-room hostel on the campus. At IIM-K, the administration took over 45 rooms (each room having two-beds) without even bothering to have the basic courtesy of informing the institute, officials said. The Covid care centres have now been turned into Covid First-Line Treatment Centres (CFLTCs).
A senior official at NIT-C said, “We have written several letters to the district administration asking them to vacate from our facilities. It’s more than seven months. We have supported them in the initial phase when people were returning from overseas. Now they need to reciprocate the courtesy.” What’s worse, the waste at the CFLTC is dumped on the campus itself, creating a health hazard. “We don’t know what to do. We are helpless,” the official said.
Kozhikode Collector S Sambasiva Rao told TNIE that the district administration was “thinking about” shifting the CFLTC from NIT-C and IIM-K to new facilities. “We have already started thinking about shifting. We are identifying new places,” he said.
At IIM-K, a senior faculty member told TNIE that there were instances when Covid patients were seen roaming around, prompting the students staying at hostels to complain to the management. “We have about 200 students staying on the campus. They are scared that things may go out of control,” he said.
Letters have been sent to chief secretary Vishwas Mehta and higher education principal secretary Usha Titus but without any response. IIM-K has also sent a missive to the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development. “We are told that the Union Ministry has forwarded the letter to the Kerala Government,” said the official.
“We fear that the recruiters will not come here. We are among the top five management institutes in the country. Anything in Kerala will not come near it. The government is destroying one of its own equities. A lot of multi-nationals are coming to Kozhikode only because we are here,” said another official.
Usha Titus, who is also on the board of governors IIM-K, said CFLTCs have been established based on the decision of the health department and the district administration.
tricky situation
The institutions fear that their objections could be interpreted as their lack of commitment towards a social cause, though the fact remains that things have moved far from the initial stages of the pandemic and now hardly any patient goes into institutional quarantine