PTU VC: Dr Salwan to head selection panel

Deepkamal Kaur

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, July 4

Finally, the process of appointment of the Vice-Chancellor (VC) of IK Gujral Punjab Technical University, Kapurthala, has restarted.

An expert in strategic defence and defence technologies, Dr SK Salwan, who has remained the VC of the varsity during the previous Congress regime, has been appointed the chairman of the selection committee. Among the other members whose names have been proposed for the selection committee are Dr Arun Kumar Grover, VC, Panjab University, Chandigarh, and Dr Sarit Kumar Dass, Director, IIT-Ropar.

A screening panel formed by the government for the purpose has shortlisted 50 candidates for the post. The list of these candidates will be given to the selection panel at a meeting in Chandigarh tomorrow.

The selection committee is expected to have interactions with the candidates from mid-July onwards.

“The selection panel will further shortlist three names which will then be sent to the Chief Minister and the Governor for the final selection,” said Parveen Kumar Thind, Special Secretary-cum-Director, Technical Education.

The post of the VC has been vacant for the past two years and a half with the Secretary, Technical Education, getting the officiating charge since the completion of the term of previous VC, Dr Rajneesh Arora. After Kahan Singh Pannu’s transfer, the charge has not yet gone to the new Secretary, Technical Education, Bhawna Garg.

Few takers for BTech

Only 985 candidates, who had appeared in the JEE Mains, have reportedly taken admission through online counselling in the 107 engineering colleges affiliated to the IKG-PTU and Maharaja Ranjit Singh PTU, Bathinda. The colleges have a total of about 35,000 BTech seats. Nearly 1,000 more seats have been filled in the second round on the basis of marks in Class XII exams.