AMU ready to conduct admission tests in Saudi Arabia

The Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) is ready to conduct entrance
tests in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries provided the request comes
from the Indian community and the respective Indian embassies, says the vice
chancellor of India’s premier institution.*

Professor P.K. Abdul Azis said M.O.H. Farooq, the former Indian Ambassador
in Riyadh, had raised the issue with him in 2008 and promised to write to
the university in this regard.

“But no one picked up on this. I am willing to do this but we would require
guarantees from the Indian Embassy for safe conduct of tests. That’s all,”
he told Arab News in an interview.

Currently, AMU conducts admission tests for various courses at four centers
in India — Kolkata, Lucknow, Hyderabad and Coimbatore, besides Aligarh,
about 140 km southeast of India’s capital New Delhi.

With a budget of Rs.5.7 billion, AMU is one of the two largest government
funded residential universities in India.

The university has reserved limited seats for NRIs and foreign nationals.

Abdul Azis, who has worked from 1993 to 2002 at the Saline Water Conversion
Corporation (SWCC) in Jubail as marine biologist, said, “Personally, I
believe that NRI component should be increased so that we become truly
international university. But so far I have not received any suggestion from
any quarter on how to do that. I think NRIs are the best people to advise us
on this matter.”

The vice chancellor said he has also told the Saudi Embassy that the
university could give Saudi nationals a special quota, if they are
interested.

AMU has 400 foreign students that include many Arabs from countries such as
Yemen, Sudan and Jordan. The reason for the low numbers is the recent hike
of tuition fee for foreign students. The AMU is working to bring the fees
down and the numbers up, he said.

Under Abdul Azis, who took over in 2007, the university is embarking on an
ambitious project of spreading its wings beyond Aligarh.

Two new campuses, one in Murshidabad in the eastern Indian state of West
Bengal and another in Mallapuram in the southern state of Kerala, are to
start functioning in two to three months time.

The two state governments have rented temporary buildings for one year. They
have also provided 300 acres of land free of cost.

The Indian government has allocated Rs.350 million as initial amount for the
new campuses. A third campus in Kishanganj in Bihar will also open once the
state government provides land.

Abdul Azis said the new campuses will offer several new courses, specially
in engineering and technology.

Besides, there will be nursing and pharmacy colleges. In the past AMU had
opened a campus in Dubai in the UAE. But it had to be closed because,
according to Abdul Azis, it was launched without “statutory backing.”

The new campuses are being opened following university rules with all the
bodies such as the university court, Academic Council and Executive Council
sanctioning the plan, the vice chancellor said.

Still, certain groups of Aligs, as the alumni of AMU are called, are
opposing the move.

Their contention is that it would dilute the residential character of the
university.

They also raise the usual theory of conspiracy against the university and
the entire Muslim community.

But Abdul Azis dismissed all the objections saying instead the new campuses
would increase the scope of the university.