Bhubaneswar, June 20: Ashok Kumar Das, who took over as the vice-chancellor of Utkal University today, said that his topmost priority would be to fill the vacant teaching posts at the earliest “for the university’s survival”.

Another priority of Das, a renowned scientist, is to set up a centralised instrumentation centre at the varsity — a facility with all major scientific instruments at a centralised place.

The premier university has a sanctioned strength of 257 teaching faculty, while there are 110 vacancies at various levels at present.

About 5,000 students are pursuing post-graduate courses in various streams and 267 colleges are affiliated to the varsity.

Das, who was the head of laser and plasma technology division at the Bhaba Atomic Research Centre, quit the job to take up the coveted post at Utkal University.

“Experimentation happens to be a major component of training and research. In order to sustain continuous interest of students, they ought to be provided with sophisticated instruments for teaching and advanced research. At present, instruments lie scattered here and there in the varsity. The centralised instrumentation centre will be a well-planned structure with all sophisticated instruments under one facility for their maximum utilisation,” said Das.

The centre will be set up with funds from FIST (Fund for Improvement of Science & Technology Infrastructure), which is given by the department of science and technology. The new vice-chancellor also put an emphasis on strengthening laboratories in affiliating various colleges of the varsity, revamping the evaluation and examination process, and refresher courses for teaching faculty with fund support from RUSA.