New Delhi: As the lure of fat pay packets draw thousands of students to the IITs, IIMs and prestigious colleges of Delhi University, private varsities seek to woo the aspirants with sprawling campuses, heated pools, beauty salons and even shopping arcades.
The admission brochures and advertisements of various private universities besides promising "world-class education" and "100% placement record", also offer facilities like on-campus retail therapy and luxury fitness services.
While public universities such as Tezpur University, Banaras Hindu university, Annamalai University and Chhatrapati Shahu Ji Maharaj University in Kanpur have their helipads, private universities such as Symbiosis' Lavale campus near Pune and Munnar Catering college in Kerala also feature in the list.
For the fashion enthusiasts, the universities which are like "mini-townships", have shopping malls on campus to offer some retail therapy. The 600 acre campus of Lovely professional University in Jalandhar which often graces full page advertisements in newspapers, has residential facilities for over 30,000 students, an open air theatre, 40 ATM machines and six bank branches.
Its shopping complex known as Uni-mall has elite supermarkets, departmental stores and even a photo studio. The varsity says the mall, which is completely managed by its students, has been set up to encourage entrepreneurship skills of students.
"Though education quality is of prime importance to any student but having a beautiful campus which has all the facilities for a comfortable life, help us focus better on studies," says a Rohan Bhalla, a LPU student.
Another student Himanshi Mehta says, "Having all the facilities on campus, from necessities to hangout zones, is important from safety point of view, especially for girls. We do not have to worry about going to the market late in the night after classes get over to fetch things".
The 63 acre campus of Sharda University in Noida has a world class cafeteria with outlets such as Café-Coffee day, Sagra Ratna, Bikano, among others. Manav Rachna International University in Faridabad has similar facilities.
Amity University, which has sprawling campuses in Noida, Jaipur and Lucknow among other cities have L'oreal Beauty Salons and laundry services provided by a London firm. World class hair and skin care solutions are not only available at Amity campuses but also at Lovely University, Pravara Institute of Medical Sciences in Maharashtra and Sathyabhama University in Chennai, among others.
"Why waste time and energy to go to a far off salon whenever you have a birthday party or any event at college," says Ridhima. "Institutions are not just for imparting theoretical education, the facilities on campus help you in overall grooming of personality. For example, I learnt dance on campus because it was available here, otherwise the thought of enrolling somewhere, managing classes, travelling to and fro act as deterrents at times," says Anukriti, a student at Galgotia University.
For the fitness freaks, these varsities also have state of the art gym facilities. Going a step ahead Galgotia University in Noida has a dance and music studio, Jain University in Bangalore has a cardio fitness centre, sauna and steam bath.
Munnar catering college has a Jacuzzi too. Air conditioned hostel rooms, ICT enabled classrooms, hi tech libraries and multi-facility indoor stadiums are not even mention worthy in the list. Quite obvious that the websites of these varsities mention huge fee structures too but few of them offer certain merit-cum-means scholarships.
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