With just two weeks left for the ambitious women bus service to start as per the direction of Chief Minister Raghubar Das in a bid to make higher education accessible especially for the female students, the universities officials even now are wedged into the tender procurement procedure. Interestingly, on the State Foundation Day, the State owned universities have been instructed to initiate the service.
The officials of State biggest varsity, Ranchi University (RU) that has much more intake of the students in both Under Graduate (UG) and Post Graduate (PG) courses in comparison to the other varsities, are still waiting to get the tender process complete.
This is when on or before October 31, all the five State-owned universities have to complete the tender process so that the suitable bidders at different varsities could take up the charge of operating the buses at designated routes according to the plan.
According to the proposed norms, the State government will merely pay the initial charges while the respective universities have been given the responsibility of hiring the agency for operation and maintenance of the buses.
“The responsibility of hiring an agency through tender process has been handed over to the varsities Vice-Chancellors way back. All the universities have the responsibility of selecting the agency accordingly for the operating buses.
We are trying that all process gets complete soon. However, no official confirmation from any university has been received by the Department yet on completing the bidding process,” said, Secretary, Department of Higher and Technical Education, Ajoy Kumar Singh.
Besides deciding upon few core issues before finalising the tender, RU Vice Chancellor Dr Ramesh Kumar Pandey though have assured that the attempts are being made to complete the essential works complete at the earliest but failed to cite the exact status of the tender floated way back.
“The officials have been instructed to complete the task on time. However, only after October 31, the university will be in a position to confirm the name of the agency who will manage this ambitious service. The tender was floated without much delay after receiving the instruction from the concerned department," RU VC added.