ADILABAD: IT Minister KT Rama Rao on Monday praised the Basar IIIT students’ weeklong agitation in support of their demands under their Student Governing Council in a democratic way without giving any chance to opposition parties to get involved.
On a visit of the IIIT, the minister heard complaints about water logging and lack of maintenance of toilets in the new mess on the campus and said, if so, the condition of the old messes could be worse.
He said education institutions and systems were badly affected in the last two years due to Covid19 and these are now returning to normality. “I would take steps to improve the facilities on the campus,” he said. Some students had told him they were planning to take admissions in NITs or IITs by leaving the
IIIT-Basar due to the poor facilities on the campus.
KTR said they will set up a digital innovation lab with 1,000 computers jointly by the Education and IT department and an outdoor stadium with Rs 3 crore in six to eight months, 50 additional classrooms with modern infrastructure and a mini T-hub to encourage research and promote entrepreneurship.
He said, in a lighter vein, that students told him the food served in the mess today was good and asked him to come to Basar regularly.
He expressed his displeasure over the MLA, the ministers and authorities sitting in the chairs on the dais while students sat on the floor during the interaction. He asked the authorities to set up fixed chairs in the auditorium by the time he visits the campus next.
“Things have started changing on the Basar IIIT campus and a lot more has to be done to improve the prevailing conditions by removing the forces that camped for a long time on the campus and caused damage to the institution,” he said.
The minister said students should work with a goal to set up companies like Microsoft, Google and Twitter.
“We have called for mess tenders but are not satisfied with the societies that have applied. There will be fresh tenders looking for good contractors to provide quality food to the students,” he said.
He insisted on conducting a week-long celebration of innovations created by the Basar IIIT students and added that students wanted him to introduce futuristic courses like robotics, ‘MI’ (Machine intelligence) and ‘AI’ (Artificial intelligence).
He would visit the Basar again in November along with ministers Sabita Indrareddy and Indrakaran Reddy to distribute laptops to students, he said.
Students also must take the responsibility to keep the Basar IIIT clean and green, he said.
Sabita Indrareddy said students must act or behave in a way that the image of Basar IIIT will improve. “We are taking all measures to resolve the problems and I am in touch with in-charge VC Venkata Narayana.”
She said the state government was providing education to nine lakh students in residential schools and free textbooks, good accommodation and quality food in these institutions.
Mudhole MLA Vittal Reddy, MLC Vittal and incharge VC Venkata Ramana, director Satish, collector Musharaff Faruqui Ali and SP Praveen were present.
