ICFAI University, Tripura, is going for huge expansion, says VC

NEW DELHI: Set up in 2004, ICFAI University in Tripura is expanding to accommodate more students from other states, more teachers, and also wants to increase library and other facilities. Already a multidisciplinary institution, it adopted the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 in 2023 and introduced the four-year UG programme. Its VC, Biplab Haldar, spoke to Careers360 about the new course structure, programmes offered, placements and more. Edited excerpts

Q. Have you implemented the four-year undergraduate programme?

A. We have adopted the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020; presently, we are offering the four-year undergraduate programme. Students can study for three years and get a bachelor’s degree and a few may study only for the diploma. We are following the NEP and accordingly, we will also have a master’s degree for one year or two years. We started implementing the programme in September 2023.

Q. Did ICFAI University face any problems implementing NEP?

A. So far, we are not facing any problem because in this university, we had already been following NEP’s main philosophy in our own engineering programmes in which we have always provided courses in humanity and social sciences. Multi-disciplinary courses were there even earlier. Suppose we have got an English programme or psychology or physical education, we have compulsory computer and English soft skills courses. It’s a multidisciplinary university and we always offer value-added courses.

Q. How did you prepare faculty members?

A. We have faculty development programmes. We call resource personnel from other universities here. Faculties from other universities also come here to be trained. We send our faculty members to attend programmes in other states. We have already conducted orientation programmes. Since we already have multidisciplinary programmes, we have a mix of people from different departments. We have engineering, humanities, social science and liberal arts departments. We have biological sciences, law, education, special education, and psychology. We also have clinical psychology. We have management, commerce, and library and information science programmes. Since we have so many departments, we are not facing any issues. The problem arises when a university does not have many streams or departments.

Q. Can you talk about the special education stream?

A. We offer a BEd in intellectual disability (ID). We also offer a diploma and bachelor in special education ID and master’s ID and PhD programmes. We also have a Centre for Disability Studies approved by the Rehabilitation Council of India. We groom the students and take care of the children but we also train those who will be future teachers to work in mainstream schools.

The government of Tripura has a project called Saksham Tripura, in which more than 100 special educators, who graduated from ICFAI Tripura, are working. They are employed in around 400 schools and around 1,500 special children are being benefited.

Q. How is the placement of students from your university?

A. The placement is very good. Mostly, it is 100% placement. We take care of campus placements for students graduating from engineering, management, and law programmes, those who complete their BEd, MEd, nursing, and paramedical sciences. We take responsibility for placing students from all the streams.

Q. Is ICFAI University, Tripura, considering expansion?

A. Infrastructure is good but we are going for huge expansion to provide better education to students. We have to provide a much wider number of classes and other facilities. More academic blocks and more auditoriums will be coming up and our library will also be expanded. Most of the students are from different states. So, we have to create more accommodation. Staff quarters are also coming up to accommodate faculty members.