PLANNER 2012

Sikkim University has been established by an Act of Parliament in July 2007. It is a Central University located in a peaceful, accessible and naturally magnificent surrounding. This University is expected to contribute substantively to the nation building process by mobilizing the rich intellectual heritage of this region, by galvanizing the academic fervour and creative instincts of the youths and by developing agencies and instruments that will facilitate cross border interactions and regional integration.

This 52 month old University which has started functioning at Gangtok with a small yet highly committed professionals is being designed in such a way so as to make it known for academic excellence and research, for its all inclusive institutional character, for refocusing on the rich cultural and natural heritage of this region and for institutionalising public-private and community partnership prcgrammes.

Being located in a geo-politically strategic location, Sikkim University has the vision of making the entire Eastern region of India a knowledge society and a custodian institution of development and environmental sustainability.

The University is guided by Madam Pratibha Devi Singh Patil, President of India as the Visitor; Prof MS Swaminathan as the Chancellor and Executive and Academic Councils that consists of cream of Indian academia and civil society. Core focus of Sikim University is the Post Graduate and Research Programmes. Sikkim University has three distinct yet interdisciplinary academic programmes consisting of Conventional Programmes, Non-Conventional pro1grammes and Policy Studies Programmes. The University has already started 25 academic and professional programmes including five M Phil/Ph D programmes, thirteen Post Graduate programmes and seven integrated programmes at the University level under 21 teaching departments and 7 more new programmes are introducing the academic year 2012-13. Most of the teaching practices are highly field intensive with strong element of oral history.

Students are admitted through all India entrance examinations held in 27 different centers in India and in Colombo, Dhaka, Kathmandu, Myanmar and Thimphu. At the moment, 10 undergraduate colleges (that already existed before 2007) with over 4000 students and 300 faculty members are affiliated to Sikkim University and the University based programmes have over 450 students.and 65 faculty members.

The historic First Convocation of Sikkim University was addressed by the President of India Madame Pratibha Devisingh Patil in April 2010. University has organized nine International conferences and more than a dozen national conferences over last four years in collaboration with national and international institutions. In these programmes, besides the students and faculty members of Sikkim University, a cross section of civil society members from both within and outside the state of Sikkim are also actively participating.

University Library

Initiation of establishing a world class, state-of-the-art University Library, with up-to-date multi-faceted printed, electronic and multi-media collection, started in the month of February, 2008 with a floor space of about 1,000 sq. ft. and presently it is hosted in a multi-stored building with a floor space of 9000 sq.ft. The Library has grown in terms of its infrastructure and facilities during the past four years. In its mission to provide the reference and research infrastructure to the academic community of the University, the Library started developing its collection with the inputs from different academic communities. The present Library collection strength has now grown to 22,000 books and 300 CD/DVD across various academic disciplines including Archeology, Religion, Pharmacology, Management, Computer Science, Chemistry, Chinese Literature, Disaster Management, Earth Sciences, Himalaya Studies, Economics, Education, English Literature, Ethno Botany, Floriculture and Horticulture, Geography, History, International Relations and Politics, Journalism and Mass Communication, Law, Microbiology, Music, Nepali Literature, Peace and Conflict Studies, Physics, Policy Planning, Psychology, Research Methodology, Sociology and others. In addition to books, Library is also subscribing nationally and internationally renowned 49 academic journals. Total 21 national and local dailies are presently being subscribed by the Central Library.

Ministry of Information Technology, Govt of India sanctioned exclusive 1 gbps connectivity to Sikkim University to facilitate usages of electronic resources. Connectivity has been established since November 2010. The entire Library building is presently Wi-Fi connected and users are allowed to access the internet facilities through their own laptop. Additionally about 10 computer terminals in the Library are solely dedicated for accessing the electronic resources.

The University is an institutional member of American Library, Kolkata. This unique facility has been provided to the users of the Library to take advantage of the collections maintained by the American Library, Kolkata.

The Library is open from 9.30 am to 6 pm on all working days. It is also open on all government and University notified holidays including Saturdays and Sundays.

As a part of University library network, satellite libraries have been established to nine affiliated colleges of the University. The University is providing books, enlisted in the syllabi of the subjects offered by these colleges, to meet the urgent need of the faculty members and the students. Recently, the University has started a branch library at Science Block. The future plans of the Library includes, developing an extensive collection of printed and electronic resources, automation of the entire system and bring all the satellite and branch libraries under the umbrella of one network, provide a multi-campus operational system, develop a digital collection of home-grown digitally born intellectual property, create an archive of relevant news clippings, provide extensive CD search service, implementing RFID based self-checking, check-out and security systems.