Jamia looking to add more hostels, lab space

Updated on: Thursday, November 17, 2011

Close to acquiring over 40 acres of land near its campus in south Delhi, Jamia Milia Islamia is looking to make a much-needed expansion to add more hostels for students and more space for laboratories.

Vice Chancellor Najeeb Jung said the university was now close to acquiring the Pahari land near Jamia Nagar that it had wanted for decades, thanks to the intervention of the office of Lieutenant Governor and the additional land would help the institution expand its utilities.

"The university had been chasing the land for about 30 to 35 years. Now due to the direct intervention of the Lieutenant Governor, we have success in sight," Jung told the gathering at the 91st annual convocation of the varsity.

He later said that the university wants to expand its hostel facilities, which are limited at present, and would also like to see more space to be accorded to facilities like laboratories.

"We have not yet got into the nitty gritty and the details of how the land would exactly be put into use. But once it is cleaned up and the rocks have been blasted, we would be looking for constructing more hostels. Also more expansion of laboratories is also required," he said while talking to reporters.

The vice chancellor was also clear that the environment at the university was not yet conducive enough for allowing a students union.

He said while a committee of senior professors was looking into the issue of when to have student elections at the campus, but he believed universities are meant for imparting education and nurturing scholars rather than "creating political leaders".

"We recently witnessed a fight outside the campus with students breaking their teeth. Under such circumstances we are not finding it conducive to have elections," he said.

The university gave away a total of 4294 degrees to students and also handed out 155 gold medals to toppers and 279 PhD degrees to research scholars.

Addressing the students and faculty at the convocation presided over by Khanna, Jung said the university had in recent times launched new centres for nano-sciences and nano-technology, besides a Centre for China Studies, a Centre for Afghanistan Studies, and Sikkim Studies programme.

He also touched upon the issue of the grant of minority status to the varsity but said the student and teaching community of the varsity "must never forget its a nationalist institution".

"The onus is upon us to preserve this persity, which we have come to value so dearly in our university," he said.

In his address to the students, Khanna asked them to seek "peace in mind" and "society" as part of the process of acquiring education.

He said the ethics propounded by Islam and other religions of prayers, and of earning through honest means, if adopted by all, would eliminate corruption and the need for fighting it through efforts like the Lokpal Bill.

Meanwhile, a group of students protested the university's decision to invite LG Tejendra Khanna on grounds that he had refused a judicial inquiry into the Batla House encounter.

The Forum for Student Democracy said Khanna had declined to pass an order for magisterial inquiry in the 2008 alleged fake encounter at Batla House in which two students of the university were killed.

"How can the JMI invite such a person to hand over the degrees who himself has denied the right to justice to students of the same institution," asked Afroz Alam Sahil, convenor of the group.

Jamia looking to add more hostels, lab space

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