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| Shiv Nadar |
In an interview with CNBC-TV18, Shiv Nadar, discuss his further plans for the university.
Below is the verbatim transcript of the interview. Also watch the accompanying video.
Q: What is this university really going to look like? How many students will you be able to enroll in the first year? Are you going operational by about August this year?
A: We would go operational in August this year. The university has been notified by the UP government. The structure of this university is considerably different from what we have in Chennai.
The Chennai University is an engineering-based institution or set of institutions and a business school. This would be a research lead multi-discipline university and not be lead by engineering. Otherwise, it is inter disciplinary by nature.
Q: This is the second university that you are setting up. What is the sort of corpus that you are working with? Is the promoter family going to be divesting anymore of its stake in HCL Technologies to fund your education initiatives?
A: Ten percent of what we earn will go towards education. When we say 10%, there is no limit to the 10%. We still have quite a distance to go.
Q: Do you mean that it is sufficient? Are you not looking at divesting anything further?
A: When we committed 10% amount of whatever our net worth is, we already had it in the bank. We don’t have to look for funding as we committed what we have in the bank. At the moment, we don’t need it. If it does happen for any reason, that’s more of a treasury decision.
Q: The university will be live in August. Will it accommodate around 8000 pupil once it’s fully set up and operational?
A: Not yet. Its targeted strength is 8000. We will be very careful about who we pick. This is not something which is advertisement driven student draw. We will go out to pick the students, who will form the student body. It will be true for faculty, students, researchers and partners.
We expect to begin the first year of the engineering school this year, and then progressively begin each of the schools. We are quite confident that next year our three schools of arts, science and business will go live.
