The 19 colleges that would be developed as centres of excellence would get teachers on priority basis.

Education department principal secretary Amarjeet Sinha said: “Teachers’ appointment in the colleges, which would be developed as centres of excellence, will be taken up on priority basis.”

The Bihar Public Service Commission would select the teachers and the appointment will be subject to amendment in the Bihar State University Act, 1976. Sinha added that the education department would issue advertisement across the country for recruiting the teachers. The appointments will be done based on the guidelines of University Grants Commission.

Sources said unless the Raj Bhavan approves the amendments in the university act, the appointments would not be done. There has been no large-scale appointment of teachers since 2003 in Bihar universities. This year, however, nine teachers were appointed at the College of Arts and Crafts after the high court directed Patna University to hire teachers because the institute was running without a permanent faculty.

The 19 colleges that would be developed as centres of excellence include, ANS College-Barh, HD Jain College-Ara, College of Commerce-Patna, Rajendra Mishra College-Saharsa, RK College-Madhubani, Purnea College-Purnea, Sundarwati Mahila College-Bhagalpur, CM Science College-Darbhanga, MS College-Motihari, LS College-Muzaffarpur, Gaya College-Gaya and others.

The principal secretary said apart from the appointments, infrastructure issues for these colleges would also be attended to. The selected colleges have been asked to submit a report related to the infrastructure development work that needs to be carried out.

The infrastructure development work would be started in this fiscal, Sinha said. He added that the colleges will have to develop its courses to make it job-fit. The courses should be developed with institutional partnership.

Citing an example, he said: “Colleges which have development studies should seek institutional partnership with top institutes dealing with the subject like the Tata Institute of Social Sciences.” For rural studies, the college should seek help from the Institute of Rural Management, Anand.