'ITIs to have upgraded infrastructure, training session for teachers'

Kolkata: The state Technical Education department has taken up a major step in upgrading the ITIs.

The project has been taken up with support from the World Bank. A good number of ITIs are being selected for upgradation and the work has already started. It is learnt that in the first phase around 28 ITIs will be upgraded.

When contacted the state Technical Education minister Purnendu Basu said: "The ITIs will have upgraded infrastructure and at the same time there will be trainings for trainers of the institutions as well under the project."

The upgradation of the ITIs include setting up of smart class rooms along with high-speed internet connection which will ensure knowledge sharing through video conferencing.

It may be mentioned that in 2011 there were only 80 ITIs in the state where only 17,636 students used to get opportunity to undertake training every year. After the change of guard in the state, the Mamata Banerjee government has set up a total of 235 ITIs where 66,740 students can undertake different training courses.

Similarly, total number of polytechnic colleges has also increased. There were only 65 polytechnic colleges in the state in 2011 and now it has increased to 147 where 37,315 students can get admission in a year. Moreover, there are 289 advanced vocational training centres now in the state. But still there are some blocks where there are no such centres. The state Technical Education department has now taken initiatives to set up the same in those places as well. Around 200 more such centres can be set up. Steps have also been taken for non-institutional short-term training programmes that will be carried out by different training providers. There are around 630 registered training providers at present and the steps would also be taken for qualitative upgradation of these training providers as well.

The state government has also decided to increase the remuneration of contractual teachers. Contractual teachers would be getting Rs 9,000 per month which was Rs 7,000 in 2010. Similarly, part time teachers and instructors would also be getting more for each of their classes and more over the ceiling on number of classes that they can take every month has also been abolished allowing them to take as many as number of classes.