Page 58 - EducationWorld January 2023

Cover Story

into global research hubs. The future
is very bright and promising,” says
Dr. Madhu Chitkara, an alumna
of Delhi and Punjab universities and
pro chancellor of CU, Punjab and Hi-
machal.
D OWN SOUTH WHERE

education institutions
promoted by success-
ful businessmen and
industry leaders is a well-established
tradition, highly-respected real estate
tycoon Dayananda Pai, promoter-
chairman of Century Real Estate
Holdings Pvt. Ltd, has established the
ambitious Vidyashilp University,
Bengaluru (VU, estb.2021) which
admitted its first batch of 74 students
mentored by 16 faculty into its School Vidyashilp University campus: digitally enabled programmes. Inset: Dr. Vijayan Immanuel
of Computation and Data Sciences last
August. stints with IMS Unison (Dehradun) of edupreneurs, philanthropists, state
Graduates of this initial four-year and Presidency (Bengaluru) universi- government leaders competing for
study programme will be awarded ties, with his near-optimal mix of ac- industry and business investment,
degrees in data sciences or a unique ademia and industry experience, Im- not least EducationWorld which has
decision sciences programme at their manuel seems the best possible choice been evangelising improved learning
option. “With industry, business, ser- to get VU promoted with a corpus of outcomes from preschool to Ph D —
vices and entertainment the world Rs.600 crore, up and running quickly. have not only stimulated business and
over going digital, it’s very important “Twenty first century youth are digital industry leaders, but edupreneurs al-
for universities to provide students natives who take naturally to explor- ready invested in education to expand
radically different, innovative study atory, experiential learning. VU will their footprint and operations.
programmes to enable them to suc- incrementally evolve into a multidis- An exemplar is Sanjay Padode,
ceed in increasingly digitalised work- ciplinary university driven by cutting- alumnus of the blue-chip BITS-Pilani.
places. Therefore, all our programmes edge technology,” he promises. In 1995, Padode founded and nur-
will be interdisciplinary and digitally- Climate change in the education tured the AACSB (USA)-accredited
enabled. For instance our next initia- sector catalysed a combination of fac- IFIM Business School, Bengaluru (re-
tive, the Vidyashilp Business School tors — emergence of new can-do tribes christened the Jagdish Sheth School of
will offer digital business as major Vijaybhoomi’s Padode & Chattopadhyay (R) Management aka JAGSOM), routinely
and minor subjects. Fortunately un- ranked among the country’s Top 15
der NEP 2020, universities have been private B-schools by EducationWorld
granted substantial autonomy under and #2 in Karnataka. In 2019, Padode
liberal guidelines. Our goal is to devel- took a giant leap forward to promote
op our students into highly competent Vijaybhoomi University — “a
digital technologies savvy, conscien- unique multidisciplinary liberal arts
tious citizens aware of their individual professional courses university” — on
and social responsibilities,” says Dr. a scenic 200 acre fully-wired campus
Vijayan Immanuel, founding vice in Karjat, a two-hour drive from Mum-
chancellor of VU. bai. Although its smooth take-off was
An alumnus of NIT-Suratkal and impeded by the Covid lockdown of al-
the Indian Institute of Science, Ban- most two years, Vijaybhoomi has tak-
galore, with 22 years (1984-2006) en wing. Currently, it has 340 students
teaching experience in NIT-Suratkal enrolled in its two-year foundational
followed by hands-on industry ex- liberal arts programme.
perience in blue-chip IT major HCL “The curriculum offered by Vijayb-
Technologies (2006-11) and short hoomi U for liberal professional edu-

58 EDUCATIONWORLD JANUARY 2023