E-Paper
₹62 cr grant to Panjab University, ₹25 cr to Chandigarh colleges under PM-USHA scheme
As per the communication from the Union ministry of education, the grant is approved under two components -- grant to strengthen colleges & the grant for gender inclusion and equity initiative
Panjab University (PU) has got ₹62 crore for equity initiatives, faculty improvement and research innovation & quality improvements under PM-USHA, a centrally sponsored scheme, while
₹20 crore has been approved for city colleges.
As per the communication from the Union ministry of education, the grant is approved under two components -- grant to strengthen colleges & the grant for gender inclusion and equity initiative.
During a project approval board meeting in February last year, ₹5 crore was approved for GGDSD College, Sector-32, Chandigarh. Now, Post Graduate Government College for Girls, Sector-42 and Sri Guru Gobind Singh College, Sector-26, have been allocated ₹5 crore each.
Under the state component, namely gender inclusion and equity initiative, ₹10 crore has been approved which will be used to renovate two girls hostels of Government Home Science College, Sector-10.
Rubinderjit Singh Brar, state project director-cum-director higher education, said that 14 colleges of Chandigarh have already got a grant to the tune of ₹2 crore each under the component -- infrastructure grant to colleges.
At present, 13 city institutions, including PU, have a National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) grade and five have been able to get ranking under National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2024.
The PM-USHA scheme was launched in July, 2023. All participating states/UTs signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Ministry. After that, the state project directorate, UT, Chandigarh, asked all eligible institutions, including PU, to prepare proposals as per the guidelines of PM-USHA. In all, 18 proposals were submitted to the Ministry, including two state components, i.e, a new model degree college at Manimajra and gender inclusion & equity initiative.
Prof Lakhvir Singh, additional state project director, RUSA said that a proposal for release of grant ₹29 crore under RUSA/ PM-USHA is also under active consideration at the Ministry level.
