Peculiar situation for Punjabi University VC; CM visiting campus; VC to chair syndicate meeting
Kanwar Inder Singh/ royalpatiala.in
Today, Punjabi university vice chancellor has called a syndicate meeting to pass the annual budget. Whereas a student organization has invited the chief minister of Punjab Bhagwant Mann.
As per programe , the university syndicate is going to present their annual budget along with other important agendas in today’s syndicate meeting. Simultaneously, Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann is visiting to address students at Guru Teg Bahadur Hall in the university campus.
All eyes are on CM’s first visit to the university campus, after taking the charge. The university employees are expecting that the vice chancellor must take up the pending financial matters of the university with the chief minister and draw his attention over this important issue.
Punjabi university is passing through a rough pace. The financial condition has gone from bad to worse. Past government had done nothing concrete for its revival.
Former chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi in November last year had announced to underwrite Rs150 crore debt of cash-strapped Punjabi University and double its annual grant from Rs 9 cr per month to Rs 20 cr per month. At that time Channi along with then finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal had declared that “It is the responsibility of the state government to support its premier educational institutions financially. We have decided to take care of the university’s debt.The university can work in a positive direction only if it is financially sound, he said, adding that from now the management need not to come like “beggars” to seek funds from the state government for its survival.”
But, that announcement too remained an announcement made by former chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi.
Even AAP’s finance minister Harpal Chaeema has said yesterday that “we will look into all the demands of Punjabi university in the upcoming state budget. The university has to wait for next three months. What the previous government has done, committed we don’t know. We will look into their demands in the state’s budget to be presented after three months”.
March 29,2022
