Last week has seen some more positive events in Bihar which augurs really well for the development plans ahead. Technical education in Bihar is set to go global. The University of Edinburgh, UK, and Iowa State University, USA, have offered tie-ups with institutes providing technical education in Bihar.

"The tie-ups will not only open the gates of the world to students of technical institutes in Bihar, but will also add to the credibility of the degree offered here because the brand name of the internationally-acclaimed universities will be added to it and it will have a better visibility in the employment market," remarked science and technology department commissioner Ajay Kumar Thakur.

The department has been entrusted with the job to process the offers made by the international universities. Prof B Sinha, emeritus professor, Institute of Infrastructure and Environment, School of Engineering and Electronics of the University of Edinburgh, has written a letter to Bihar CM Nitish Kumar expressing the desire to bring a delegation headed by the deputy vice chancellor (international affairs) to meet him.

In another development, Rajendra Sinha, instructor, international business, Des Moines Area Community College, Ankeny, Iowa, USA, has suggested the Bihar CM to visit Iowa along with his officials to discuss the offers made by Iowa State University (ISU). He has suggested discussing the modalities of setting up partnership "to fully operationalise the five engineering colleges and 17 vocational/technical schools in Bihar.

In another news on Infrastructure development the Bihar government has hired the services of a US firm to conduct quality checks of the roads in the state.

The firm M S V International, having expertise in bridge and highway construction, has been contracted for two years for Rs 3.59 crore. It will conduct over 40,000 quality checks, Road Construction Minister Nand Kishore Yadav said on Saturday.

The minister flagged off the Mobile Testing Van (MTV) equipped with state-of-the-art gadgets for testing soil, stone chips, bitumen and other material on Thursday. He said the MSV was fully equipped to submit reports on the quality of roads within 24 hours of collection of the sample .