Bangalore University Details

Bangalore University is a public state university located in Bangalore, Karnataka, India. The university is one of the oldest in India, dating back to 1886. The university is a part of The Association of Indian Universities (AIU) and affiliated by University Grants Commission (UGC).

The University was opened as the Central College, Bangalore in 1886, by the British Government to award University degrees. It was renamed as the Bangalore University from Central College, Bangalore by the UGC, India on July 10, 1964 by the government under the then State of Mysore to consolidate institutions of higher education in the city of Bangalore.

The university operates from Jnana Bharathi Campus.

The Central College, Bangalore (established in 1886) and the University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering (UVCE) (established in 1912) (the two original institutions in Bangalore) were subsumed into this university. With the promulgation of the Karnataka State Universities Ordinance of 1975, which aimed at bringing uniformity to all universities in the state, the university lost its federal character and became a state-affiliated university. In 1973, the University moved to the Jnana Bharathi Campus located on 1,100 acres (4.5 km2) of land.

The Bangalore University gave birth to universities like Visvesvaraya Technological University, Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences and the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences.

The university's Institute of Aerospace Medicine (IAM) has been designated by ISRO to train astronauts for the Indian space program. Bangalore University has been awarded the Sir M Visvesvarya chair from ISRO to perform research in space science.

Because the University produces the largest number of Ph.Ds in India, it has acquired a good reputation among foreign universities. Consequently, the university hosts a growing number of foreign students.

Campus[edit source | editbeta]

Bangalore University is the largest University in India. It has two campuses: City Campus: Central College and Jnana Bharathi Campus.

Administration[edit source | editbeta]

The Vice-Chancellor was Dr. N Prabhu Dev. He resigned as the V-C on October 13, 2012 to accept the Karnataka government's offer of chairmanship of the Karnataka Health System Commission.[1] Dr Prabhu Dev's term was to end in February 2013. His predecessor H A Ranganath, too, resigned prematurely in 2008 to assume charge as Director of the National Assessment and Accreditation Council. B Thimme Gowda, professor in Chemistry, Mangalore University has been appointed as the university's new vice-chancellor.

With more than 650 affiliated colleges, the Karnataka government has decided to bifurcate, or 'carve out a new university' to ease of management. To this effect, the state government had appointed two significant groups of study. One group was headed by former Gulbarga University Vice-Chancellor N Rudraiah and another was a group formed by the Karnataka State Higher Education Council.[2] The Rudraiah study suggested trifurcation of the university, while the Council suggested bifurcation.

However, the state government has decided to go ahead with bifurcation to create a Bangalore North University, which will be named DVG Jnanavahini University. KR Venugopal, principal, University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering, has been nominated as the special officer to oversee the bifurcation process.[3] With its main campus in Hoskote, the new university will cover one taluk (North) of Bangalore Urban district, three taluks (Hoskote, Devanahalli and Doddaballapura) of Bangalore Rural district and Chikkaballapura and Kolar districts. The existing BU, with Jnanabharathi as its main campus, will cover Bangalore South, East and Anekal, along with Nelamangala taluk and Ramanagaram.

Distinctions[edit source | editbeta]

The School of Engineering

In 2001, the university was accredited by NAAC and received Five Star Status. The university then once again reaccredited under the new grading system with a grade A.

Sir C.V.Raman, Nobel Laureate physicist, was associated with the University while working at the Indian Institute of Science.He had announced his Nobel winning work at the University premises based in Central College, Bangalore in 1927.He was awarded the Nobel prize in 1930.

Professor Leonid Hurwicz who served Bangalore University as a Professor in Economics won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2007. Professor Hurwicz served as a Professor of Economics at Bangalore University from 1965-1968. During his Fulbright year, he taught classes at Bangalore University. Professor Hurwicz credits his Fulbright experience as "an important phase in my development and a significant influence in the development of my economic theories."

In a first, the University in 2010 announced admissions for transgenders by reserving one seat in each PG course.[4] Now, the University's admission forms feature a third category of gender, namely 'Others'.[5]

Facilities[edit source | editbeta]

A bio-park has been constructed. In the process, the students have acquired experience in land management for social forestry. The university, for the first time in the country, constructed an NSS Bhavan to promote such activities. Faculties of the Civil Engineering, Geology, Geography, Mathematics, Zoology, Botany and Microbiology have been involved in making Bio-park a reality. Rain water harvesting and ground water recharging are a part of Bio park as also aqua culture and ornithology.

The library of the University is located in the JB Campus and City Campus. The JB campus Library has a floor area of about 6500 sq.mts. and has a collection of 3.25 lakh volumes. It subscribes to over 250 national and international journals. In addition, it also receives 50 journals as gift/on exchange basis.

Prasaranga is a publication unit of the University and is located at J.B. Campus. It publishes text books, university journals and periodicals. In the last 30 years it has published 800 textbooks and reference books in English as well as several articles and Monographs in Kannada to cater to the awareness needs of the public. The students of the communication department bring out a news journal regularly. These activities are supported by the printing press of the university.

An inter-library exchange facility is available between the university and the libraries of other institutions located at Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Bangalore etc. The library has been computerised since 1992. There are 3.25 lakhs books, 172 Journals, (national-110, international- 62), 68 magazines are subscribed to. The library also provides reprographic facility, computers, audio, video cassette, internet and INFLIBNET ProgrammeE and inter university loan facilities.

There is a Health Care Centre at J.B. Campus which is manned by two resident doctors; services of visiting specialized doctors are available.

At J.B. Campus there is a gymnasium with facilities for indoor games, basketball Courts, Kho Kho ground and swimming pool. At the Central College campus a cricket stadium consisting of turf wicket, basketball court, volleyball court and lawn tennis is available to students. Every year around 45 inter-collegiate sports competitions are held for men and women section. Nearly 1 lakh students from 398 affiliated colleges participate in these sports events.

For inter university tournaments, committees of experts select the Bangalore University teams. The students are given incentives through scholarships, fellowships and fee concessions. They are also provided with placement assistance on the completion of their programmes. B.P.Ed. and M.P.Ed. students get stipend. Sportsmen of the University have competed at the State, Regional, National and International tournament.

The University Science Instrumentation Centre located at Sneha Bhavan at the J.B. campus looks after the maintenance and servicing of the instruments of the user departments in the University. USIC also conducts refresher courses for college teachers and training for interested students.

There are welfare programmes initiated by the institutes like subsidized transport facility for the university staff and students, subsidized canteen facility, free medical aid and reimbursement of medical expenses including on hospitalization, loan facilities from GPF. The University stands guarantee for house building loans sanctioned by the HDFC and also all other nationalized banks and co-operative societies.

There are seven hostels on the J.B. Campus and three on the City campus. There are two men’s hostels at Tumkur and Kolar and one Ladies hostels at Kolar. Hostel canteens are managed by student prefects.

In the City Campus a Grievance Cell is attached to the Examination Wing of the University. Through the university's web-site redressal of grievance and clarification of queries pertaining to examinations, can be obtained.

The Bio-Park is a novel idea proposed on the 600 acres (2.4 km2) of land in the J.B.Campus. Rain Water harvesting and Watershed Management are initiated by the University on the J.B.Campus. The University has also a Robotics and cyber centre, a Yoga centre, and a Gandhian Studies centre.

Academics[edit source | editbeta]

Academically, the University is structured into six faculties- Arts, Science, Commerce & Management, Education, Law and Engineering. It has 43 Post Graduate Departments, a Postgraduate Centre at Kolar, (Started during 1994-95), three constituent colleges, 665 affiliated colleges (of which 115 have PG Courses) and several other Centres and Directorates of higher learning and research under its purview. At present, the University offers 50 Post Graduate Courses and Employment Oriented Diploma and Certificate Courses. The University has launched the Five years Integrated Courses in Biological Sciences, Social Sciences, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and Business Studies and the Four years B.S. Programme.[6]

عع==Departments==

Library[edit source | editbeta]

The Bangalore University Library has two wings, one in the Central College Campus which came into existence in 1858, and one at Jnana Bharathi Campus in 1966 with about 35,000 books.

Bangalore University has evolved a project called BALNET (Bangalore University Library Network program). The project has connected all the libraries in the university within the campus and in the affiliated colleges libraries within the digitalised system.

The library digitization is the first of its kind in India. The project is the brain child of Dr P V Konnur who is the librarian at the university.

The Bangalore University Library has self-check stations, workstations, wireless access connections and audio-visual equipment. Apart from the provision of individual reading areas, group study areas (discussion rooms and reading rooms) are also available to facilitate group-based assignments among students

Bangalore University Library is housed in a Star Moduled functional building which includes wings for reference section stack rooms and reading halls, periodical sections, computer centre and administrative divisions. The collection of books has reached 3,500,000 and grows at a rate of around 5,000 titles annually. The library subscribes to 450 periodicals covering 45 disciplines. About 50,000 bound volumes of back issues of journals are organised in subjectwise arrangement.