Research Council (RC) has failed to hold meetings at Sher-i-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, Jammu on time for the past five years.
It can be found in documents that while there were eight mandatory meetings supposed to be conducted by the Research Council (RC), only three meetings have been conducted. 15th meeting of RC was held in November 2015, 16th meeting on March 2017 and 17th meeting on March 2018. This caused a failure in following recommendations of RC and the researchable issues suggested by various line departments.
There are also allegations that SKUAST-Jammu failed to deal with 28 out of 30 issues pointed out by the line departments in various meetings of RC between 2011-12 and 2017-18. 33 out of 67 issues pointed out by the line departments in various meetings of EC and ZREAC were not solved. The pending issues included hybrids development, climate/disease-resistant varieties of various food crops, genetic characterization of local breeds, soil testing and mineral mapping, degradation of pastures for fodder, etc.
The University council chose 14 researchable areas. Out of these areas, work on 7 important issues was not started till February 2019. These are:
- Establishment of germplasm bank and development of genetically modified/ transgenic crops
- Setting up of climate change research and remote sensing unit
- Improving local breeds of buffalo through embryo transfer technology
- Setting up a database on Bakerwali goats
- Toxicological studies of currently used pesticides
- Genotyping of animals for disease resistance and enhancing meat and milk production
- Collection and digitisation of information about natural resources at district level using GIS and remote sensing technique.
Project proposals on six of these issues are yet to be submitted. Final successful result of three issues was not achieved. These are:
- Development of database for forewarning of pests and diseases
- Study of impact of deficit rains on agriculture and allied sectors
- Installing animal disease monitoring and surveillance Lab
Remaining four issues were being worked on at various divisions of the University. As University failed to fully execute these projects, it could not provide sufficient technical support to farmers of the State by developing modern methods of agriculture/veterinarian by making genetic improvement in food crops/livestock.
Co-ordinator of School of Biotechnology (SBT) said that seven projects could not be started because of lack of funds and infrastructure needed by the University bio-safety committee.
