Punjabi University, Patiala, to close Mohali centre

Mohali, September 17

Facing the financial crunch, Punjabi University (Patiala) has decided to close down its Regional Centre for IT and Management in Phase 7, which had catered to local students for the past two decades.

The centre had been offering a host of courses, including MBA, MBA (Executive), MTech (CSE), MCA, MCA (lateral entry),.

During the inaugural session in September 2000, the centre had over 600 students but the number has gone down considerably and at present, there are only 60 students enrolled at the centre, whose operations cost the university Rs3.2 crore annually.

With the Patiala varsity already running a government college in Phase 6 and Khalsa College in Phase 3, students have been asked to shift there. The varsity authorities have transferred 12 faculty members out of a total of 18 faculty members from the centre.

Meanwhile, a senior professor of the university had come to the campus to take students’ consent but the latter raised slogans in protest against the authorities.

Jaskaran Singh Bhullar, a student, said the faculty was shifted two months back and since then, students had been requesting the authorities not to close the centre. He said it would be difficult for them to adjust to the new environment in another college. — TNS