As research is an integral part of the University, a number of institutes and centres have been created for the purpose. Their mandate is to carry out work in the frontier and emerging areas of various disciplines, strengthen and enrich teaching programmes (through their researches) undertake both consultancy and community impacting projects. The University has a string of such establishments, brief details of which are as under:
It was established in 1978 with generous funding from DST, UGC and the Government of Telangana to conduct research in various fields of Human Genetics and find remedies for genetic disorders. Its highly sophisticated equipment is used for the study and treatment of genetic diseases including AIDS and health related projects sponsored by various institutions are in operation. The objectives of the Institute are:
The Institute conducts research in the following areas:
The Institute in addition to offering service to the people affected with genetic disorders also imparts training to the PG students of Science, Obstetrics and Gynaecology from universities and Nursing and DMR students in the areas of Clinical genetics, Molecular genetics and Human Cytogenetics. Para-medical personnel also receive training from this Institute. The Centre offers a range of extension services to hospitals and clinics. It often conducts community service camps.
Centre for Mentally Handicapped : The Centre for Mentally Handicapped was established by Osmania University as an extension programme of the Institute of Genetics in 1993 on the occasion of Platinum Jubilee Celebrations of the University. The Centre runs on a self-financing basis and is under the overall control of the Institute of Genetics. The Centre has Training, Service and Research facilities that cater to the needs of mentally retarded people.
Realising the importance of Navigational Electronics to the country and the specific needs of the Department of Civil Aviation and the Indian Air Force, the Department of Electronics (DoE), Government of India, decided to create a national centre for expertise in this area. Osmania University was selected for this purpose and the R&T Unit for Navigational Electronics came into being in 1982 as a sponsored project of the DoE. It continued to enjoy this status till September 1992 when, in recognition of the excellent services rendered by it to user organisations, Government of Telangana made it a permanent establishment of Osmania University by funding its recurring expenditure. NERTU has three well-equipped laboratories: the Microwave and Navigational Laboratory, the Signal Processing Laboratory, and the Central Computer Laboratory.
Activities and Achievements:
The core resource of NERTU is its scientific staff, which has enviable expertise in Navigational Electronics. Research activities of NERTU encompass wide areas of Electronic Navigation. It also organizes Short Term Courses, Symposia and Workshops in the broad area of Navigational Electronics that aid in the manpower development in the area. Since its inception, NERTU has executed several consultancy projects that enabled the Unit to earn nearly Rs.l 1 million. Some of the important projects executed by NERTU, with funding agencies mentioned in the parentheses, are:
Entrepreneurship Education is an acknowledged resource for progress of the nation. Further, it is immensely useful to engineers. The concept is working positively in bringing prosperity all over the world. The EDC has been spearheading entrepreneurship education in the college since 1988, with the belief that a successful entrepreneur is not necessarily born but can become one through well-conceived and directed activities.
The College of Engineering introduced entrepreneurship course as one of the elective subjects for BE degree in all branches of engineering in 1989. Interaction of students with field experts (from industries, banks, government agencies, small industry organisations, first generation entrepreneurs and other financial agencies) is arranged at workshops conducted by EDC.
Osmania University is conscious of the need to acquire recent, authentic and scholarly international publications, and to disseminate technical information. But the high cost of this service is severely affecting the academic community. Establishing an Information Dissemination Centre for the Faculty of Engineering was therefore considered a worthy project to be undertaken in the Platinum Jubilee Year of the University (1993). Thus the IDC came into existence in the year 1995. It now operates from the basement of the Diamond Jubilee Library of the University College of Engineering. Currently it subscribes to over 120 journals of international repute, with subscriptions from two private Engineering Colleges, MCA Colleges who are members of IDC, and substantial funding from the University. It is presently disseminating technical information to all its members by periodically circulating the Current Content List and Abstracts of articles. It has photocopying and faxing facilities in addition to Internet access and Laser Printing.
Nizamiah Observatory:
The Observatory was established way back in 1908 at Begumpet. Nawab Zafar Jung, who donated a 15-inch refractor telescope and an 8-inch astrograph, was instrumental in starting this Observatory under the patronage of the Nizam of Hyderabad. In 1918 the observatory was transferred to be under the direct administrative control of Osmania University. Nizamiah Observatory was privileged to participate in an International Programme called "Carte-du-Ciel" which consisted of mapping and preparing on extensive Astrographic Star Catalogue from the accurate measurements of co-ordinates of stars. This scientific venture culminated in the publication of twelve volumes of catalogues giving accurate positions of nearly 800,000 stars.
This apart, it also participated in solar activity studies during the International Geophysical Year (IGY 1957-58) and the International Quiet Sun Year (IQSY 1964-65).
Japal-Rangapur Observatory (JRO)
Japal-Rangapur Observatory came into being in 1963 with the installation of a 48-inch reflecting telescope, which was the biggest telescope not only in the country but also in South East Asia for many years. Since then, JRO is carrying out advanced research in optical astronomy resulting in the publication of numerous research papers in reputed astronomical journals of India and abroad. The auxiliary instrumentation includes a photometer, spectrograph, scanner and a CCD camera. Japal-Rangapur Observatory made significant contributions at the time of the Total Solar Eclipse of February 16, 1980 and in the study of Comet Haley during 1985-86 by participating in the International Haley Watch programmes. Recently, the JRO was one of the firsts in the country to capture the impact of images of the Comet Shoemaker-Levy on the Planet Jupiter in July 1994.
The Centre for Plant Molecular Biology was established through an initial grant of 25 million Indian rupees from the Department of Biotechnology, Government of India in 1991 in unique recognition of Osmania University's track record in the field of Genetics. The main focus of the CPMB is on basic and applied research in Plant Molecular Biology, Plant Genetic Engineering, Cell and Tissue Culture, Gene Transfer through wide hybridisation, mapping and incorporation of novel genes in rice, groundnut, chickpea and cotton. The CPMB has a separate building housing the laboratories and offices and is surrounded by 20 acres of experimental fields for research. The Centre has been provided with grants for buying equipment, which give it the cutting edge in the field of Plant Genetics.
Research Mandate of CPMB
Centre for Area Studies on Urban Development and Regional Planning in the Indian Ocean Region was established by the U.G.C. in 1983, and it is renamed as Centre for Indian Ocean Studies. The Centre is conceived as a multi-disciplinary research organisation to enquire into the geo-political, urban and regional planning, environmental and resource problems of Indian Ocean littorals, Islands and land-locked States. The multi-disciplinary concerns of the Centre span across four major subjects of Social Science: Economics, Geography, Political Science and Sociology. Other objectives of the Centre include visits of Indian scholars to Indian Ocean; Region, holding of conferences, seminars etc., by inviting. experts from India and abroad. The Centre is headed by a Director and supported by five dedicated faculty members. The Advisory Committee under the Chairmanship of the Vice Chancellor manages the functioning of the Centre. The Centre's library has a specialised collection of 2,700 books and journals. Its special feature is press library, which chronicles daily events of 50 countries and also the issues pertaining to the countries of the Indian Ocean Region. The Centre brings out a bi-annual newsletter, which presents a review of the major events in the region and provides an annotated bibliography of recent literature on the area. It has undertaken joint research projects with institutes/ universities in India and abroad. It is a research centre useful for the scholars of Social Sciences.
Realising the need for research in Urban Development and Administration, the Government of Telangana established an Urban Administration Centre in the Department of Public Administration in the year 1966-67. Subsequently, Government of India came forward for starting Regional Centre for Training and Research in Municipal Administration in 1970 extending its canvas to meet the needs of the four Southern States, viz., Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Pondichery. The Centre has over the years emerged as a nodal agency in south India in urban management studies. The Centre has collaboration with a number of national and international organisations like UNICEF, ODA, World Bank, Royal Netherlands Government as well as Government of India. The Centre's thrust has always been empirical action research and the conduct of objective oriented workshop. It is currently servicing all the ODA assisted Slum Improvement Projects in select Indian cities. Apart from important project linked training, it has embarked on extension education in slum communities to bridge the gap between the campus and the community. The Centre also undertakes evaluation studies and has its own building and hostel to accommodate the trainees. The Centre is headed by a Director and assisted by a Professor along with four Associate Professors and project staff.
The Centre has the following objectives:
The Centre has published a number of books, research reports, occasional papers and articles in professional journals. The Centre has a rich library collection of over 10,000 books and its subscribes to over 40 research journals. It is a recognised research centre for the scholars of Urban Administration and allied areas. It has its own guest house to accommodate the out-station participants and scholars.
The new technologies of communication from the PC-assisted learning systems to the mass-based radio and television today offer an unparalleled opportunity to reconsider conventional practices and institutions. The notion that teaching and learning can be taken out of the confines of existing schools and colleges, that teaching can be individualised and insensitive to geoclimatic distance is one which has emerged out of the telecommunications revolution sweeping across the world in the 1980s and 1990s. If education is a life long process, then it is necessary to use these communication technologies to ensure the continuous updating and upgrading of knowledge.
Audio Visual Research Centre at Osmania University was established in 1983, under the auspices of the University Grants Commission, as part of the UGC INSAT TV PROJECT to produce educational television programmes telecast daily on the countrywide classroom. It was also designed as a region wide resource centre providing a user and training facility for educational institutions as also to develop and promote the use of educational technology resources among teachers and students alike. The Centre is located in a spacious building of over 8000 sq.ft. on the sprawling Osmania University campus and has the following facilities:
Activities
During the past 13 years, the Centre has produced over 300 video programmes for telecast on various subjects ranging from agriculture, astronomy, culture, economics, history, literature, ecology, and other interdisciplinary subjects. In addition, the Centre has also produced more than 60 classroom lectures in Chemistry and Zoology for University Video Lectures Courses (UVLC). Series of programmes such as Book Fare and Round Table have received critical acclaim among specialists and lay audiences. Several of the programmes have won awards and acclaim at national and international video competitions every year at the Sony ICD Video Competition, Japan and the UGC-CEC National Video Competitions. Additionally, the Centre has been able to offer various services such as the production of educational television programmes on various topics. The Centre is involved in the following activities:
Research and Training
The Centre has carried out extensive research in various aspects of educational television. These reports range from formative inputs into improvement of programme quality, audience assessment and content analysis, and local and national experimental studies. The highly motivated and competent research faculty has generated more than 20 research reports. A number of workshops for training of faculty and students, internship facilities for students were conducted. The involvement of the Centre's staff in training programmes of different hardware and software institutions has enabled the Centre to reach out to the community in which it is located.
The Southern Regional Centre of the ICSSR was established in 1973 on the first floor of Osmania University Library in collaboration with Osmania University and Government of Telangana. Its founder Director was late Prof G. Ram Reddy. The Centre is headed by a Director and assisted by a Deputy Director, a Documentation Officer, a Research Associate and the supporting staff. The Centre was started with the following objectives:
The functions of the Centre include documentation and bibliographical work in the regional language, to supplement social science journals of the southern universities, to organise seminars, lectures, to provide financial assistance to professional associations and journals, study grants to scholars, to translate materials, and to offer guidance to scholars. It is a recognised research centre for the scholars of social science disciplines.
The Dairat-ul-Ma'arif-uI-Osmania, founded in 1888, investigates, collects, preserves, edits, and publishes rare, original and standard works in Arabic on humanities, religion, science and arts ranging from the first to eight century Hijra (6th to 14th Century A. D.), which are becoming extinct. During the past 107 years, the Dairat has edited, printed and published more than 500 major standard works based on manuscripts, photostat or microfilms collected from the famous libraries in Europe, Russia, Turkey, Egypt, and other countries. Some eminent scholars like Nawab Anwarullah Farooqui Fazeelath Jung, Mr. Syeed Hussian Bilgrami and Mulla Abdul Quayyum played a significant role in the establishment of Dairut-uI-Maarif in 1888. The following are the objectives of this institution:
It has so far published more than 300 rare books in Arabic covering a wide range of subjects like History, Philosophy, Mathematics, Astronomy, Islamic Dogma, Metaphysics, Mysticism, Arabic Lexicon and Grammar, Geography etc. Dairutul-Maarif is a recognised research centre for the scholars of Arabic Language and Literature. The office of the journal, Islamic Culture, launched in 1927, is also housed in the building of Dairat-ui-Maarif.
In the year 1973 the Department of Hindi synchronized its Silver Jubilee Celebrations with the Fourth Centenary Celebrations of Rama Charit Manas and resolved to construct 'Tulsi Bhavan' to be developed as an Advanced Research Centre for Devotional Studies. In 1990, it came under the control of Osmania University. The Foundation is working as a National Research Centre in the area of Devotional Literature and provides information in this field to the scholars from different parts of the country. The activities of the Foundation help in bringing together different religions, regions and languages of the country and promote national integration. The Centre has a good library containing reference books, rare manuscripts and the books related to Devotional Literature. It is a research centre that is useful to the scholars of the Departments of Hindi and Philosophy. The Foundation arranges periodic seminars and extension lectures by eminent scholars.
The Sanskrit Academy, founded in January 1954, is a semi autonomous institution functioning under the auspices of Osmania University. The objectives of the academy include the collection, preservation and investigation of old and rare Sanskrit manuscripts, undertaking the publication of research work pertaining to Sanskrit and to promote Sanskrit learning, in general and research in particular, Sanskrit Academy is the only research institute of its kind in the entire Telangana. It has published 58 books. And has a library collection exceeding 4,000 books. The Academy also published a catalogue of Sanskrit manuscripts of Osmania University.
The Centre, established in the university in 1997, strives to promote women's studies through teaching, research, action, fieldwork and extension. The Centre is presently located in Arts College building. The centre seeks to promote a better understanding of the multi-dimensional contributions made by the women to the process of sustainable development. The Centre attempts to provide access to better opportunities and counter the existing disparities and makes efforts to change the basic social attitudes due to gender inequality across the class, caste and region. The Centre's objectives are
Osmania University is the proud owner of the Ronald Ross Memorial Building situated near Hyderabad Airport. The building was handed over to Osmania University by the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage with a view to maintain and preserve it for the benefit of posterity. It is in this building that Sir Ronald Ross (1857-1932) conducted his Nobel Prize (1902) winning discovery of the transmission of the malarial parasite. The Osmania University in cooperation with the Indian Medical Association conducts academic and scientific meetings in the building. A modest collection of photographs and pictures depicting the life and achievements of Sir Ross are on display here.
Conscious of its commitment to the community around it, the University decided to start a Centre for Solid Waste Technology and Management (CSWTM) in the University College of Engineering in June 2000. It is the first of its kind in the state of Telangana and envisages for itself the creation of wealth from waste as well as providing a clean environment for improved public health.
The Centre looks forward to joining hands with the local government/municipal bodies to take up the gigantic task of disposal and management of 2500 tons of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) generated every day in the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad. While, local government/ municipal bodies would essentially handle collection and disposal of MSW, the Centre would play a pivotal role in dealing with other aspects of Solid Waste Management Programme. Such as (a) Creating awareness amongst public about the need for better Solid Waste Management, (b) Motivating public at large to clean the local surroundings, (c) Developing training modules for the benefit of waste management professionals, (d) Providing consultancy on the design and construction of Transfer Stations and Landfills and (e) Facilitating transfer of new technologies from developed countries.
It is located in the Prof. G. Ram Reddy Centre for Distance Education and is directed by Prof. S. N. N. Pandit, Retired Professor, Department of Statistics, Osmania University.
In view of the environmental problem faced by the developing countries, it is desirable to promote Environmental-friendly Technologies like Solar, Wind and Bio-mass Energies. These Technologies can be tapped in a decentralised form to avoid grid connected losses. Since Solar radiation is available through-out the year, Solar-Thermal and Solar-Photovoltaic Technologies offer maximal potential for power generation.
India being a major agricultural country, agricultural residues like Bagasse, Cotton Stalk, Groundnut Shell, and Rice-husk could be utilized in the form of Bio-mass energy for power generation. Municipal waste, generated in Indian cities, is a major environmental problem. This waste can be disposed-off utilizing incinerators, and the gas produced can be utilized to run Gas-turbine Power Plants, thereby reducing environmental pollution and also augmenting additional power generation to meet the rural energy needs.