CAMPUSES OF THEIR OWN

Bihar government set up three new universities in 2018. Five years later, they still don't have permanent campuses.

-  Sanjay

Three new state-government-run universities in Bihar Patliputra, Purnea and Munger celebrated their fifth foundation day on March 18 but at temporary campuses. None of them have their own buildings.

In March 2018, Bihar government established these three universities to meet local requirements, reduce the strain on existing institutions and improve the state's gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher education. However, like the other 14 state universities, students of Patliputra, Purnea and Munger Universities are also facing delays in academic sessions due to shortage of teachers and other administrative reasons.

In the absence of their own campuses, all three universities are functioning from temporary offices in colleges affiliated to them. The state government has allotted land but teachers believe it will be another five years before they have permanent campuses.

Students and teachers said they lacked even water, sanitation and properly-equipped classrooms. Online admission and examination portals have frequent glitches and payment gateway crashes cause students to lose money.

"There should be a library, reading room and other facilities in a university. But, we do not even have fans, toilets or water. We pay Rs.300 as university portal fee in a year but in the last five years, have not experienced its smooth functioning," Sunny Jha, second-year M.Com student of Munger University, told Careers360.

Despite such strained infrastructure, Bihar state universities are set to introduce the four-year undergraduate programme (FYUP) from the upcoming academic session.

3 universities, 228 colleges

The three universities are together in charge of over 220 colleges that were earlier affiliated to other universities.