Plan to turn agri varsity in Bihar into central university gathers pace

NEW DELHI: A bill to convert Rajendra Agriculture University (RAU) at Pusa, Samastipur, in Bihar into a central university will be introduced during the monsoon session of Parliament beginning on July 21. The Union Cabinet is likely to soon approve the draft of the proposed legislation.
Though a memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed by agriculture minister Radha Mohan Singh and the then Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi in January, the matter got stuck in political logjam when Nitish Kumar replaced Manjhi as chief minister in February.
Manjhi had resigned as CM on February 20 on being expelled from the Janata Dal (United). Although Manjhi’s resignation had no impact on the MoU, officials here believe that the entire preparation got delayed due to change of guard in the state.
The Centre, which has to take the next step of getting the bill cleared in Parliament, meanwhile, wrote to the state, asking to initiate a process to acquire land for four colleges which the agriculture ministry wants to set up at Saran, Aurangabad, Motihari and Madhubani under the RAU.
The agriculture minister had on May 20 written to Nitish, requesting him to arrange 75 acres of land each for the four proposed colleges. Though Nitish remained quiet over the land issue, Radha Mohan Singh appears to be confident of pushing the central university bill.
Singh told TOI that the Centre would go ahead with the central university bill even if Nitish refused land for the four new colleges. Both the issues are not linked. Land for new colleges can be acquired later, he said.
“The Centre is committed to convert RAU into a central university. Efforts are on to get it approved by the Cabinet and subsequently by the Parliament,” said Singh.
Once the bill is passed and the conversion is notified, RAU will be the second central agriculture university in the country after the one at Imphal in Manipur.
The standing finance committee of the finance ministry has already sanctioned Rs 400 crore for the purpose of converting RAU into a central university. Since the Centre aims to get the bill passed and get necessary notification issued before announcement of assembly polls in Bihar, relevant papers had been circulated among the Niti Aayog and different ministries including finance, law and human resource development for their views on the proposal on June 5.
Though the proposal to convert RAU into Rajendra Central Agriculture University (RCAU) had been pending since 2009 when the Planning Commission gave formal consent, the matter did not proceed further during UPA-2 (2009-14) as neither the Centre nor the state government could reach to a solution to the pending court cases filed by permanent staff of the RAU.
The NDA government, however, could manage to end the uncertainty and it was agreed that the court cases of the staff will be attended by a special cell created for this purpose. It was also decided that the engagement\adjustment of such staff in the RCAU will be subject to the requirement of staff in various programmes and the decision of the central university after outcome of the court decisions.