36-year-old Kudmul Ranga Rao Girls Hostel Demolished to give Way for Rs 8 Cr New Facility
Mangaluru: Kudmul Ranga Rao Girls Hostel, near PVS Building, Kodialbail-Mangaluru is the only girls’ hostel exclusively for the SC/ST students in the City has been a testimony to the government apathy for the last so many years. Dalit girls who are studying in various institutions in the City were deprived of hostel facilities for some time years ago. In the meantime, thousands of Dalit students were looking for private paying guest accommodations although the government had committed to providing a hostel for them.
In 2015, Dalit leader S P Anand had stressed that there were no adequate facilities for inmates of Kudmul Ranga Rao hostel, and many SC/ST students were applying for a hostel stay. Finally after a few years, in the wake of the department receiving a large number of applications seeking admission to hostels, a proposal had been sent to the government for providing accommodation to the applicants in a rented building.
And now it is learnt that after the 36-year-old building is demolished, a brand new facility of four floors will be built in the same location at a cost of Rs 8 crore, where about 300 plus SC/ST Dalit girls will be accommodated as against the earlier capacity of around 130 students. Apart from accommodation, they will be provided with free food.
The original hostel building was inaugurated by the then Union Minister Janardhan Poojary along with MLA Dhanajaya Kumar and MLA Blasius D’Souza on 2 October 1984, and after 36 years, this old building is being demolished to make way for a brand new girls hostel for SSLC Dalit students, with modern facilities.