Guwahati, Aug. 3: Cotton College, which was recently upgraded into a state university, will soon tie up with Columbia University to share knowledge and expertise on development projects.

A team of the US-based university officials, led by its director of Earth Institute and professor of health policy and management, Jeffrey Sachs, today visited Cotton College campus to chalk out plans to tie up with the prestigious university in all possible ways. The team interacted with the teachers and faculty of the Cotton College.

Education minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who attended the interaction, said as part of the collaboration, a group of teachers and researchers from Cotton College would jointly work in the ongoing development projects on health and education in Morigaon district, along with experts from Columbia University and health department officials.

“The basic purpose of the collaboration is to provide the teachers and researchers of Cotton College an opportunity to share knowledge and expertise with Columbia University and apply them in the field. As we are already jointly implementing the model district project on health in Morigaon, we have decided that a group of teachers from Cotton College will work with them to gather practical knowledge,” Sarma said.

The model district health project under the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) was launched in Morigaon in September last year and is being jointly implemented by the health department and the Earth Institute of Columbia University. Morigaon became the first district in the country to have started the project and is among the five districts (the rest being one each in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar) to have been selected under the model district health project.

The project aims at reducing infant and maternal mortality rates in Morigaon district and achieving the millennium development goals by 2015.

“We are also launching a similar education project in Morigaon and the team from Cotton College will jointly work in both the health and education sectors. This is just the beginning and as part of the academic tie-up, we will try and work out exchange programmes of teachers and researchers of both the institutions,” Sarma said.

Sachs has assured that Columbia University would send a delegation to Cotton College to work out the modalities and arrange a workshop to finetune the areas of interest.