Bhubaneswar, Aug 25 (PTI) The Odisha government on Thursday announced to invest Rs 1,000 crore to upgrade the state-run Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology (VSSUT) into a Centre of Excellence for technical education and compete with IITs and other national institutes.

This was stated by chief secretary Suresh Chandra Mohapatra after a visit to the institute along with other senior officials.

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"The state government will develop VSSUT as a centre of excellence for technical education. Over Rs 1,000 crore will be spent for the transformation of VSSUT," Mohapatra told reporters.

Stating that a master plan for the purpose will be prepared and submitted to chief minister Naveen Patnaik within a fortnight, the chief secretary said around 80 acres of land has been identified for the expansion of VSSUT. Now, the university has 5,000 students.

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The government is planning to increase its capacity so that 10, 000 students, teachers and faculty can stay in the campus, he said.

The team of officials led by Mohapatra held discussion with the students, teachers, vice-chancellor during the visit. They also inspected the existing facilities in the VSSUT campus.

The state government had earlier upgraded the University College of Engineering (UCE), Burla, to VSSUT in 2009. The UCE was established near the Hirakud dam in 1956.

The chief secretary and other officials also visited Goddess Samalei temple and reviewed transformational works being done in the shrine.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)