The university will have its headquarter,a small eco-friendly campus at Dharamshala and the large campus at Dehra The Central University of Himachal Pradesh can finally roll now. The Central government has approved the split-campus theory of the site selection committee (SSC) according to which the university headquarter and a small eco-friendly campus will come up at Dharamshala,while another large campus will be set-up at Dehra,about 45 km away from Dharmshala. On Friday,the Ministry of Human Resource Development (HRD) conveyed to the state government the final notification about the university and acceptance of the SSC report submitted last month. The committee head by Sunil Kumar,an additional secretary rank IAS officer in the HRD ministry,had visited both the locations in February. The Central University of Himachal Pradesh is one of the 18 new central universities cleared by the Centre in 2008. Deputy Commissioner,Kangra,R S Gupta,who was in Shimla,confirmed he has been informed by Vice-Chancellor Professor Furqan Qamar,about the Centres decision to set up a campus near Dharamshala and other large faculties viz an engineering college,a medical college and sciences blocks will be located at Dehra. Since there have been some reports about the site at Dharamshala being seismically sensitive and unfit for large construction activity,only a small campus for faculties like management and humanities will be established here.Only low and eco-friendly earthquake proof structures will be built to suite the local environment and ecology, says the report. While accepting the suggestion of the state government about Dehra,where it has made huge land available for the university,the Central government has put responsibility on the local government to obtain environmental clearance for the identified parcels of land free of all encumbrances. Dehra,a sub-divisional headquarter of Kangra,falls in the parliamentary constituency of Anurag Thakur,son of Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal. It is also the constituency of Viplove Thakur,a Rajya Sabha member and former PCC president here. Both have to face opposition form sitting Lok Sabha member from Jodhpur (Rajasthan) Chandresh Kumari,who strongly lobbied for Dharamshala as the appropriate site for the new university of international standards. Kumari,a former Congress minister in Himachal Pradesh from Dharamshala,had lost her Assembly seat in 2007,which she apparently wants to keep warm for her son to contest the next election in 2012. The location of the university had hence become a contentious issue in the state,which delayed the institution for over a year. V-C Furqan Qamar said,I am happy that the Centre has accepted the recommendation of the site selection committee. This clears a big hurdle in the process for setting-up the university, he said.
