5yrs on, cradle takes shape

Brambe (Ranchi), July 24: Five years after it was first proposed and one false start later, the Institute of Hotel Management, Catering Technology and Applied Nutrition at Brambe took a big step towards taking shape today with chief minister Arjun Munda laying the foundation stone, albeit for the second time. The prestigious institute will come up at a cost of Rs 20 crore, of which Rs 12 crore will be provided by the Centre and the rest by the state. Conceived to train students in hotel management through a three-year degree course to start with, the institute was first proposed in 2006 and the foundation stone laid by Munda himself, as he was chief minister then. However, after that, the project stalled. Speaking at the ceremony today, Munda admitted that the state had let students down by delaying the institute all these years. “The file just went from one table to another in the tourism department all these years. We failed to do justice to the aspirations of the students. We failed to teach them to grab opportunities which are around,” the chief minister admitted. The ceremony was attended by Union tourism minister Subodh Kant Sahay. Among others present were state tourism minister Vimla Pradhan, Lohardaga MP Sudarshan Bhagat, Mandar MLA Bandhu Tirkey, tourism secretary Smita Chugh and principal secretary to the chief minister D.K. Tiwary. The proposed institute would be the first state-run hotel management cradle. Among private institutes offering similar courses in the state are BIT-Mesra and ISM-Pundag. The institute will come up over five acres at Brambe, close to the temporary campus of Central University of Jharkhand. Asking his officials not to delay matters any further, Munda ordered that the facility should be built within a year so that the academic session could get underway from next year itself. At present, all institutes of hotel management around the country taken together produce only 14,000 graduates in a year, as against a requirement of about 2 lakh personnel. On the occasion, Sahay asked the state government to prepare proposals to develop tourism in the state and seek money from the Centre. “The Union tourism ministry has agreed to provide funds to the tune of Rs 50 crore for developing a mega tourism circuit in and around Ranchi. Spend the sum as soon as possible and give the Centre more such proposals,” Sahay told Munda. Sahay added that if Jharkhand was interested in developing a golf course, his department would provide fund to the tune of Rs 25 crore. At the ceremony, Munda also launched a new scheme — hunar se rojgar (from skills to employment) — in which the state tourism department would train young boys and girls to become hotel housekeepers, tourist guides etc, to generate employment opportunities.