BackPSUs tap Super 30 to create own talent pool
PSUs tap Super 30 to create own talent pool
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New Delhi: Public sector units are leveraging Super 30, the popular Patna-based coaching phenomenon for Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) aspirants, in their human resources and corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives and to create an engineering talent pool for themselves.
State-run NTPC Ltd, India’s largest power generation utility, has got the institute’s co-founder Abhayanand to coach the children of employees who are spread across its 27 projects.
Oil and Natural Gas Corp. Ltd (ONGC) is in talks for a similar coaching tie-up for the children of its employees, spread across the country.
Other public sector units such as Power Grid Corp. of India Ltd, GAIL (India) Ltd and Oil India Ltd are training poor students for the joint entrance examination (JEE), conducted for admission to the IITs, as part of their CSR exercise.
Abhayanand will help “coach our children at the projects", Arup Roy Chowdhry, chairman and managing director of NTPC, said. “We are starting the coaching for 12th class students from this year through our communication network. It will start from 1 November."
The NTPC programme will have local supervisors who will be selected from among the spouses of the utility’s employees and will coach the children through e-lectures for which a dedicated communication system will be installed.
Super 30, also known as the Ramanujan School of Mathematics, is a coaching institute that trains underprivileged, but meritorious, children of Bihar for JEE. The academy has produced scores of IITians. Founders Abhayanand and Anand Kumar parted ways in 2009.
Children aspiring to be taught at the academy have to pass a stringent entrance test, and about 5,000 candidates apply for the 30 positions that are offered every year. For the deserving, food and board are provided at a meagre Rs6,000 a year.
The NTPC programme will target students who are in class XII and also those who have cleared their board examinations and are preparing for admission to IITs.
“Apart from teaching physics and maths through virtual classrooms, I would also be selecting students and teachers for the programme and advising them on academic matters,’’ said Abhayanand, a 1977 batch Indian Police Service officer now serving as additional director general of police in Bihar.
“ONGC is also planning IIT coaching for its employees’ children across all the cities where their offices operate. It’s a large-scale programme and we are still in talks,’’ said S.K. Shahi, director at Delhi-based Centre for Social Responsibility and Leadership, a non-governmental organization which deals in consultancy, training and programme execution of CSR initiatives.
GAIL started a programme titled “Utkarsh Superb 30" in Kanpur last year with 23 students who were provided free residential coaching.
The intake for the current year has been increased to 60. GAIL has also granted engineering scholarships to the selected students. “As far as these students are concerned, GAIL will always have a special place for their prospective career," said S.L. Raina, director of human resources, GAIL.
utpal.b@livemint.com
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