PM ANNOUNCES RS.10,000 CRORE FUND TO 20 UNIVERSITIES ACROSS THE NATION

Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced Rs 10,000 crore fund to 20 universities across the country for next five years, with a vision to make them “world-class” institutions.

“Top 10 public and private universities will be freed from all government control and get Rs 10,000 crore over five years. All these universities have to do is to demonstrate their potential to become world-class institutions,” Modi said during his address at the centenary celebration of Patna University (PU).

He said that the 20 universities will be not selected by him, or a chief minister or any other political figure, instead their potential will be assessed through a contest judged by a third party.

The announcement came after Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar requested the center to grant central status to the PU – country’s seventh old university.

Even as the PM extolled Bihar’s historically high standing as a land of knowledge, saying the state’s “heritage of knowledge is as old as the flow of the Ganga, on whose banks Patna University stands,” he gently rejected the demand for central university status to this institution.

“I think central university status is a talk of a bygone era. I want to take it a step higher,” Modi said, before announcing Rs 10,000 crore funds to 20 varsities.

He is the first prime minister to visit the 100-year-old Patna University.