A project a report on the proposed National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER) unit in Madurai was submitted to the Union minister for chemicals and fertilizers, M K Azhagiri on July 21 by R C Jha, director, Department of Pharmaceuticals following his visit to Madurai with an expert team last week.
Jha said that the Ministry has formed a 20 member committee comprising members from industry, government and academic institutes with respect to establishment of NIPER in Madurai. The committee is exploring all the possibilities for establishing the project.
Last week the team after visiting Madurai, called on the faculty members of the School of Biotechnology of the Madurai Kamaraj University. They inspected the advanced laboratory facilities at the University. Later they visited Madurai Medical College also, Jha said. He will further visit the state by the end of this month to have more discussions with the government officials and the university staff.
It is learnt that the department of pharmaceuticals is looking for an academic collaboration between the biotechnology department at the university and the NIPER at Madurai. "We are exploring all the facilities and all the ways, including those of the Medical College," he said. According to sources, the laboratory and hostel facilities of the university would be utilized for the proposed NIPER to start with.
The director said he cannot assure anything about the courses to be started in the beginning. However it is learnt that the academic collaboration with the University would be for offering two postgraduate courses such as Pharma Informatics and Pharmaceutical Biotechnology.
