During the run-up to the General and Assembly elections, a lot of promises were made about setting up of top class central institutions in Visakhapatnam.
Though the Central government has kept up its promise of sanctioning the institutions to the newly carved out Andhra Pradesh, it appears that the State government is faltering on its assurances, when it comes to Visakhapatnam.
The question that arises in the minds of academicians - is Vizag getting a raw deal - and Vice-Chancellor of Andhra University G.S.N. Raju, says ‘Yes’. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has sanctioned a new IIT for Andhra Pradesh in his budget. But Vizag seems to be nowhere in the radar for the proposed IIT, despite a proposal for upgrading the Andhra University College of Engineering to an IIT is pending with the HRD ministry. IIT option for Tirupati is being weighed by the State Government.
“The Central government will only sanction, it is up to the State government to decide the place and Vizag appears to be out of the contention,” said the V-C of AU. Coming to AIIMS, the Finance Minister has sanctioned one to Andhra Pradesh out of the four new ones. But again Vizag is out of contention. State Health Minister Kamineni Srinivas, has said that Mangalagiri or Vijayawada could be the choice.
The only hope was the Agricultural University, and senior academicians were keeping their fingers crossed that the Regional Agricultural Research Station (RARS) in Anakapalli would be the option. But the State Agriculture Minister has confirmed that the university would come up beside RARS in Lam, on the Guntur- Amravathi Road. IIM has not been allotted in this budget for AP, so what are the options left? Central University, which was proposed in the AP Reorganisation Bill, could be an option. But the political fraternity is divided on this issue and Vizag seems not to be the favourite destination.
On whether AU should be upgraded to Central University, again the leaders have a different opinion. While Prof. Raju feels that AU can be upgraded and will benefit the cash-strapped university, politicians feel a new Central University at some other place would bring more employment and students.
