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           | New Delhi, Jan 9 : The government will issue an ordinance   to create 12 new central universities, it was announced here   Friday. "This is being done because the bill to create the universities   could not be passed in parliament (in the session that concluded last month),"   Home Minister P. Chidambaram said here Friday.
 He was briefing reporters   after a cabinet meeting presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan   Singh.
 
 The new universities will be established in Bihar, Gujarat,   Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala,   Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu, Chidambaram said.
 
 In addition,   the Dr. Harisingh Gour Vishwavidyalaya at Sagar in Madhya Pradesh, the Guru   Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya at Bilaspur in Chhattisgarh and the Hemvati Nandan   Bahuguna Garhwal University at Srinagar in Uttarakhand would be converted into   central universities, the minister said.
 
 These institutions currently   function as state universities.
 
 "The proposed ordinance would contain all   the provisions of the Central Universities Bill, 2008 pending in the Lok Sabha,   with such changes as may be necessary to implement the accepted recommendations   of the parliamentary standing committee, which include, among others, dropping   of the conversion of Goa University into a central university," Chidambaram   said.
 
 
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