'Assam to have two more agricultural universities'

A Correspondent

JORHAT, April 12: Two new agricultural universities will come up in the State along with two more colleges. On the whole, Assam will have 11 agricultural colleges and three agricultural universities. “The second new agricultural university will come up in the Barak Valley while a veteriry university will come up in the Barpeta-Ramdia area. In the past few years, number of applicants for studying agricultural courses in the State and the region has gone up. In 2009,  we received applications to the tune of 800 and in the year 2017 it rose to 15,100,” Dr. KM Bujarbaruah, the Vice-Chancellor of Assam Agricultural University during a media interaction held at the AAU Scientist Home on Thursday to discuss the completion of 50 years of AAU and the Vice-President of India’s visit.

Dr Bujarbaruah said that except Assam and Odisha, all other States in the country had more than two agricultural universities. Assam and Odisha only had one each. So a proposal has been placed to the Government of Assam to set up more agricultural universities as the number of students is multiplying fast. Moreover, at present students from eight countries are studying at AAU while the university also had tie-ups with institutions in Australia, USA, UK, Nepal, Bangladesh, Kenya and Greece.