The first cluster university in Maharashtra state is set to be named (pending final notification) after nuclear physicist Dr Homi Bhabha, father of atomic energy in India. "The huge sizes of public universities in the state have resulted in difficulties in managing the administration, affecting research, delaying exam results and other goof-ups,” director of Bombay’s Institute of Science (IS) Vasant Helavi was quoted in The Times of India (ToI) of August 10, 2018. Bhabha’s alma mater, IS will be the lead college in the cluster that currently includes Sydenham College of Commerce and Economics, Elphinstone College and the government’s BEd colleges as components. A cluster university can have up to 100 colleges affiliated to it, said the ToI report. Colleges affiliated to Bombay University can switch over to the new university.
Institute of Science (Photo: Ashwin Tahiliani) leading the first cluster university
to be named after Dr Homi Bhabha (above)
The cluster university got the central government’s nod under the Rashtriya Utchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (National Higher Education Campaign) earlier this year. After the component colleges cease to be a part of Bombay University and become part of the cluster university, "they will follow a separate administration process, curriculum, academic calendar, exam patterns, etc drawn up by their own bodies,” according to the ToI report.
"With fewer students in the new university, exam results could be announced in 15 days,” Helavi told the newspaper. Other reforms proposed include more practical based learning even for traditional courses and mandatory internships.