Bhubaneswar, Feb. 8: The fate of the Institute of Mathematics and Application (IMA) here continues to hang in the balance with neither the Centre taking a decision on its merger with the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) nor the state government making its stance clear on the proposal to accord it the centre of excellence status.

The institute has been running with one permanent teacher for the past three years - which seems to have become a disincentive for students.

The institute authorities put the centre of excellence proposal before the state government after the decision to merge it with the ISI had got delayed. The state government, though enthusiastic about the proposal as the institute authorities say, is, however, yet to make up its mind.

'Our governing body members met chief minister Naveen Patnaik recently and suggested that the state government should help to develop the institute into a centre of excellence. The chief minister appeared to be enthusiastic about it. The science and technology department, the institute's parent body, then sought a proposal, which has also been submitted,' said institute director Sudarshan Padhy.

He said the situation of the institute having a single permanent teacher might continue for next few months till the state government took a decision on the proposal. New faculty members could not be appointed as the Centre kept the merger proposal hanging. The flow of fund from the state government has also shrunk due to the merger hope.

'Once the state government accepts the proposal in principle, we will be sure that things will happen in the next few months and new recruitments will take place according to the norms. If the government denies, we will go for hiring teaching faculty abiding by our present norms,' said the director.Sources said that though the Centre was yet to inform the institute about its decision on the merger proposal, unofficially it was being said that chances were slim.

The IMA that provides two-year masters degree in computational finance and three-year bachelors degree in mathematics and computing has around 110 students. The sanctioned strength of teachers in the institute is seven. The institute has guest faculty and even the director takes classes at times. Though managed by the science and technology department, it is affiliated to the Utkal University.

Set up in 1999, the institute initially organised camps to train students preparing for the Mathematics Olympiad and the Samant Chandrashekhar Scholarship. In 2007, it started undergraduate and postgraduate degree courses and shifted to its present building at Andharua on the city outskirts.

Sources said that earlier the state government used to sanction around Rs 3 crore to the institute, but when merger talks began, it reduced the funding to around Rs 1.6 crore.

The institute has converted a room into a library. It also has a 90-bed hostel. The state government had earlier accepted a proposal to build a 200-bed hostel, but it did not materialise.

Padhy said students who are picked through highly competitive national-level exam come mostly from outside the state. The BSc courses are in maximum demand. However, the MSc course in computational finance being offered here is in focus as only a few institutes have it. After completing the courses, the students get absorbed by financial institutions as research experts and financial product designers in software trading firms. Similarly, BSc students have been doing research in IITs and other reputed institutes.

'If the institute either gets merged with the ISI or turns into a centre of excellence, it will have research facilities and its own set-up. It will also vie for autonomy,' he said.

'Though we stay on the campus, none of the teachers reside here. We have to wait for a long time to get our doubts cleared,' said a student.

Padhy said they had never kept students and parents in the dark about the prevailing situation. 'We tell them everything at the time of admission. But, of course, it is our duty to provide students with the best possible teaching with our available resources,' he said.

Commissioner-cum-secretary of the science and technology department Surendra Kumar said the government had received the proposal from the institute authorities. 'We are looking into its different aspects. But, I cannot comment on the central government's stand on the merger proposal,' said Kumar.