Cabinet grants NITs autonomy

With Indian technology industry booming like never before, the government has decided to upgrade 20 National Institutes of Technology into full-fledged technical universities.

With Indian technology industry booming like never before, the government has decided to upgrade 20 National Institutes of Technology into full-fledged technical universities.

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The Cabinet on Thursday approved the National Institutes of Technology Bill, 2006, which envisages replacing the present administrative framework of 20 National Institutes of Technology with a more autonomous one.

The bill will be introduced in the May session of the Parliament.

Once the bill is enacted, the societies governing the NITs will cease to exist and the institutes will be placed directly under the administrative control of the HRD ministry with boards of governors heading affairs. The chairperson of the board will be appointed by President of India, who will also be Visitor to each institute.

The ministry will also have a say in the appointment of the director and deputy director of each institute. "They will be appointed by the central government, with prior approval of the Visitor, for a term of five years," the Bill states.

A senior ministry official informed, "As regards power and autonomy, these institutes will be like the central universities. The NITs will be able to award their own degrees, start new courses as per the changing demands and initiate research projects. The new law will help them increase the intake of students by 8-10 per cent in the next two to three years, in much the same way as the Indian Institutes of Technology".

Ministry officials say the NIT Bill is the second law for technical education institutions after the Indian Institutes of Technology Act of 1961.