What about GU?

The report of the National Institutional Rankings Framework (NIRF) 2022 has also brought good news for Gauhati University, the oldest university in the entire North-eastern region. According to the NIRF 2022 report, Gauhati University has secured the 36th position among all the universities in the country. Additionally, Gauhati University has also improved its position in the 'Overall' category by climbing from the 67th rank the previous year to the 64th this year. Established by one of the first legislations passed by the Assam Legislative Assembly after India attained independence, Gauhati University was a brainchild of the region's great leaders of that era, who were headed by none other than Lokapriya Gopinath Bordoloi. No wonder the Gauhati University campus is called Gopinath Bordoloi Nagar, in honour of the great visionary, who was also the first from the entire region to have been conferred a Bharat Ratna. While the present Vice Chancellor of Gauhati University and his team must be congratulated for this achievement, the fact remains that Gauhati University often hits headlines for one wrong reason or the other. This is, of course, inevitable, especially because it is an old university, only one year younger than independent India. Moreover, there was a time when various lobbies and internal politics had almost crippled the university. Holding examinations on time, declaring results keeping in tune with other leading universities of the country, keeping student politics under manageable levels, and curbing corruption – are some of the challenges that Gauhati University had to face in the past few decades. It is also a fact that for quite a long time the captains of Gauhati University had failed to start courses to keep pace with changing times. Areas like Social Work, Rural Development, Ethnic Studies, Wildlife, Flood Management, etc., had remained out of the imagination for Gauhati University for quite a long time. The result was that it only produced Masters's degree holders in certain traditional subjects. Being the oldest university in the region, Gauhati University should ideally have pioneered studies and research in areas like the various aspects of the Brahmaputra, the Eastern Himalayas, South-East Asia, China, and Buddhism, apart from creating a pool of experts on various aspects of the rich ethnic diversity that the Northeast has. With the new rankings providing a much-needed morale booster, now is the appropriate time for Gauhati University to engage in brainstorming in these areas.