Patna, May 18: National Knowledge Network has failed to take off in the Patna University as most of the colleges under it do not have the basic infrastructure required for the project.

The National Knowledge Network, a Union ministry of human resource development (HRD) department initiative, aims at connecting major educational institutions in the state.

Patna Science College, BN College, Magadh Mahila College and Patna Women’s College were to be connected to Patna University through an e-network. The National Knowledge Network is the brainchild of Union HRD minister Kapil Sibal. The network aims at sharing knowledge through specialised resources and collaborative research among scientists, researchers and students from diverse fields across the country.

A team from National Informatics Centre (NIC) visited Patna Science College campus to select of the department, which will be centrally located for running the project there.

Atul Aditya Pandey, the in-charge for running the project at Patna Science College, said: “The NIC team visited the college and selected the physics department having videoconferencing facility from where students will be taught. The team asked for a project proposal that we submitted. However, after that there has not been any interaction with the NIC team,” Pandey said.

The National Knowledge Network aims to connect colleges of other universities of the state, such as JP University in Chhapra, BN Mandal University, Madhepura, Magadh University in Bodhgaya, with colleges affiliated to Patna University.

Patna University Teachers Association (Puta) general secretary Randhir Kumar Singh said: “It will be a huge task for Patna University to successfully implement the project. The university has to strengthen its infrastructure with construction of separate labs, purchase of computers and other equipment required for the running the project and also had to give special training to its manpower for running the programme.”

The university runs 71 vocational courses and 28 traditional courses and is already facing a shortage of employees in running them. There has been no fresh appointment of employees and teachers in the past few years, Singh said.

Singh said: “The shortage of employees can be assumed from the fact that there is just one non-teaching employee looking after postgraduate departments of Bengali and Maithili. If the project is implemented one can imagine how one person would manage all the work.”

He added more than 60 per cent of non-teaching employees do not have proper knowledge in computers.

Sources said during the tenure of HRD secretary, K.K. Pathak, the project received a special impetus. Pathak had personally taken interest in the project. The former HRD Secretary had also prepared a road map for the implementation of the project in the state. However, after Pathak’s exit from the HRD department, there were no takers for the project.