Jadavpur: The Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS) is set to have its second campus to be built on a 30-acre plot in Baruipur, on the southern fringe of Calcutta.

Union science and technology minister Harsh Vardhan, who laid the foundation stone of the Baruipur campus at a programme at the Jadavpur institute on Thursday, set a deadline of March 31, 2020, for the project.

The institute, now a deemed university, was founded 143 years ago by philanthropist doctor Mahendra Lal Sircar. C.V. Raman had worked there since 1907 till he joined IISc Bangalore in 1933.

It was at the IACS that the physicist had discovered the Raman effect, which brought him the Nobel in 1930.

This is the only instance so far of an Indian winning a Nobel Prize in science based on work done at an Indian institute, IACS director Santanu Bhattacharya said.

Meghnad Saha, Satyendra Nath Bose and K.S. Krishnan are some of the luminaries who had adorned the ranks of the institute, the director said.

"This institute has a glorious past.... C.V. Raman is the only Indian to have received a Nobel Prize... while working in Cultivation of Science for his monumental research in physics.... He had worked with frugal facilities.... The new centre that is to be set at the Baruipur campus will have the best and latest modern equipment to enable scientists conduct advanced researches at par with the researches done in top institutes in foreign countries.... I am hopeful this institute can produce great scientists who can bring a Nobel Prize again," the minister said.

The new campus - to be called the Syamaprasad Mookerjee Advanced Research and Training (SMART) - will have the facilities for cutting-edge research in multiple disciplines such as fundamental sciences, engineering sciences and medical sciences.

The cost for the first phase of the project has been estimated at Rs 350 crore.