The Rs 1,000 crore Kolkata-based Techno India will be investing Rs 500 crore by 2012 in the higher education sector.
The diversified group with interests in food processing, film production and health segments, has several engineering colleges.
“By 2012, we will set up 25 new campuses. Two new hospitals are coming up on EM Bypass and Barrackpore. We are also coming up with the Techno Global University in Shillong,” said Satyam Roy Chowdhury, Managing Director, Techno India group.
The group has been given 25 acres in Agartala by the Tripura government. It plans to set up engineering and medical colleges. It has also got land near the Indian Institute of Management campus in Kolkata, where it plans to set up a medical and a dental college.
Techno India set up its engineering college in West Bengal when the sector had been opened up for the private sector in the late 1990s. Some experts feel that the state has been plagued by the lack of quality engineering institutes except the top notch ones such as the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, Jadavpur University Faculty of Engineering and Bengal Engineering and Science University. Techo India institutes are considered to be amongst the better equipped engineering colleges in the private sector. Apart from the education sector, the group plans to foray into the food processing and film production segments. Four films are lined up for production, informed Roy Chowdhury.
The group plans to take its turnover to Rs 2,000 crore by 2012 from the current level of Rs 1,000 crore. Roy Chowdhury said the group would finance its expansion both by internal accruals and by financial institutions. “About 20 percent funds will come through internal accruals and the rest will be through the financial institutions,” said Roy Chowdhury.