JORHAT, March 20 � As the State Government has allegedly neglected activities related to giving shape to the Jorhat Institute of Science and Technology (JIST) as a front-ranking institute of the region to attract brilliant engineering students since the last five years, several citizens, including lawyers of the city, have expressed concern over the issue and demanded the Government�s special attention towards improving the institute.
Citing official documents, a local advocate, Rintu Goswami, at a press conference held here on Thursday, said that the State Government�s Budgetary allocation for infrastructural and academic activities of the JIST since 2009 has been insufficient to develop it as a modern-day institute of science and technical studies. Besides, a principal is yet to be appointed permanently at the JIST, which was supposed to be upgraded to a front-ranking institute after the amalgamation of the Jorhat Science College according to a Cabinet decision taken in 2008.
�The State Government has not allotted sufficient monetary grants. Since its inception in 2009, a sum of only Rs 1.5 crore has been allotted for infrastructural works, while another amount of Rs 3 crore was allotted for the construction of girls� hostels. Though a sum of Rs 22 crore was said to have been allotted for the administrative building and the principal�s quarters, no construction work has started as yet,� maintained Goswami.
As the required teaching staff , workshop and laboratory facilities are lacking in the institute, engineering students have to go to the Jorhat Engineering College for practical classes. These deficiencies have discouraged the students of the JIST which now offers BTech in Electronics and Telecommunication, Power Electronics and Instrumentation, and BSc in Information Technology and some other Science disciplines.
Goswami alleged that the JIST�s autonomous society, headed by the Chief Secretary of the State, changed the earlier decision of the Government in 2013 and took a new decision to retain the JIST as a general institute of Science education as it had been in its earlier existence as a Science college offering BSc courses alone.
The autonomous society�s decision of 2013 discarded the Government�s earlier aim of shaping the JIST as a reputed institute of technological studies, which will deprive meritorious students of poor families of Jorhat and many other parts of the State who want quality engineering studies with government support.
�Like other citizens of Jorhat, I also suspect that the State Government has refrained from spending funds for the proper development of the institute only to help individuals who have started private engineering institutes in Jorhat. If the Government develops the JIST into a front-ranking institute of science and technology for engineering students, some private institutions will not be able to attract students, who have to cough up several lakhs of rupees for technical courses in private engineering institutes,� said the advocate.
Goswami said that the private players have taken full advantage of the Government�s negligence towards the JIST. As some powerful politicians of the State allegedly have stakes in the private engineering colleges, the State Government has refrained from upgrading JIST into an institute of quality education with sufficient infrastructure and manpower, he alleged.
As the JIST has a total land area of 250 bighas of its own, advocate Goswami and many other citizens at the press conference appealed to the Government to develop the required infrastructure through proper expenditure and monitoring.
�If the State Government fails to do so, we request the Government should hand over the land area to the Central Government and appeal to the Human Resource Development Ministry to make the JIST a modern-day institute of technological studies. People of Jorhat need an institute which is equivalent to an IIT,� Goswami said.
