Centre approves Vizianagaram-Titlagarh 3rd railway line project

Following is a report from the Sambad:

Patnaik urges Prabhu to set up workshop in Kalahandi

Following is a report from the Hindu:

Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has urged Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu to consider the recommendation of a Joint Working Group to set up an Electric Locomotive Periodic Overhaul workshop in Kalahandi district of Odisha.

The recommended workshop would need about 250 acres of land and his government is ready to provide the same free of cost for the greater benefit of the State, Mr. Patnaik said in a letter to Mr. Prabhu on Thursday.

The joint working group comprising Odisha Chief Secretary and the General Manager of East Coast Railway was set up to do an analysis of rail-based industries and suggest the most suitable factory or workshop in Kalahandi where earlier a wagon maintenance workshop had been announced in Railway Budget, 2013-14, Mr. Patnaik said.

 The committee deliberated on various possibilities and based on actual demand and other economic considerations of Railways, it has recommended for setting up of the workshop, he added.

The group has also done a feasibility study based on the current operations and concluded that there is an immediate need for a 60 locomotives per year capacity workshop, Mr. Patnaik pointed out.

Varsity status to Rajendra College soon: minister

Following is a report from the TOI:

Bhubaneswar: The Rajendra College (Autonomous), Balangir, will be upgraded to a university soon, said school and mass education minister Debi Prasad Mishra at Balangir on Thursday. The ministerwas in the western Odisha town to open a subsidized cooked meal outlet Aahar. The move may materialize in 2017-18, he said.

It is part of recommendations made by the SP Adhikary Committee in the draft education policy-2016. The panel has suggested to delink colleges in Kalahandi, Balangir, Nuapada and Sonepur districts and bring them under the proposed university after upgrading Rajendra College.

Initailly, the college was affiliated to Utkal University. It was upgraded to a degree college in July 1946. It was brought under Sambalpur University in 1967.

Apart from Rajendra College, the draft education policy has also recommended upgradation of VD College-Jeypore, Rourkela Government College, Government College, Angul, and SCS College, Puri, to universities to ease the load of Berhampur, Sambalpur and Utkal universities.

Government sources said the state has recommended upgradation of VD College and DD College, Keonjhar, to universities under the central government’s Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan in the next academic year. No such recommendation has been made for the Balangir college to the Centre. Once upgraded the Vikram Dev College would be the affiliating university for colleges in Nabarangpur, Koraput, Malkangiri and Rayagada districts.