(From left) RK Sinha, Janak Pandey and M Nehal release the 2012 prospectus for Central University of Bihar at Patliputra Ashok in Patna on Wednesday. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

Central University of Bihar will start seven new postgraduate courses from the 2012-13 session, while the Union and state governments are still in a deadlock over the varsity’s site.

Students would be able to take up life science, economics, English, Hindi, political science and international relations, sociology and MTech in computer science. The new session will start around mid-July.

With this addition, the number of courses will go up to 16.

Admission to the 16 courses will be conducted through Central Universities Common Entrance Test (Cucet) 2012. The last date for the online and offline (students can apply at the CUB counter at Birla Institute of Technology, Patna) application process is May 15. It started on April 11.

Online, the students can apply at www.cub.ac.in, the CUB website, or at www.cucet.co.in, the common website of Cucet.

CUB registrar Mohammed Nehal said: “The offline examination will be held on June 3, while the online examination will be held on June 9 and 10. Results will be declared on June 15. The applicants can download their scores. There are 15 seats for the MTech course and 20 seats for the remaining 15 postgraduate courses.”

Janak Pandey, the vice-chancellor of CUB, said: “Though the issue of the CUB site is still undecided, the varsity is moving towards academic excellence with more number of courses being launched every year.”

The central varsity started functioning three years ago from the Birla Institute of Technology, Patna, campus with a two-year postgraduate programme in development studies, a subject taught in a few universities in India.

Officials at CUB said the varsity could not start many courses over the past three years in the absence of a permanent building and proper infrastructure. However, it has now set its mind to start the new courses.

Pandey said: “The university administration is planning to run a few courses from other locations, preferably in Patna.”

Varsity sources, however, said the administration is optimistic about the Centre and the state government finalising the CUB site in a few months. Once the issue is settled, the new campus would be huge and pose no problem in running the courses.

Pandey said students, as well as the university, would benefit once the CUB site is finalised, as it would boost academic excellence in the state.

The vice-chancellor, however, stressed that neither the university nor the state government has a role in finalising the varsity site. Under the Central Universities Act, 2009, passed by Parliament, the Centre has been bestowed the power to decide the site of a central university.