The Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) is a public funded agricultural university located in Ludhiana district of Punjab. It is a state agricultural university in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. It was established in 1962 and is the nation's third-oldest agricultural university, after Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agriculture & Technology,

Pantnagar Pantnagar is a town and a university campus in Udham Singh Nagar district, Uttarakhand. Nainital, Kashipur, Rudrapur and Kiccha, Haldwani are the major cities surrounding Pantnagar. The town is home to the first agricultural university of I ...

and Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology, Bhubaneshwar. It was formally inaugurated by the then Prime Minister of India, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, on July 8, 1963. PAU pioneered the Green Revolution in India in the 1960s. It was bifurcated in 2005 with the formation of Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (GADVASU). The Farmers Fair, which have been organised by the PAU since 1967, see the footfall of at least one lakh farmers in two days on PAU campus in Ludhiana, Punjab (bi-annually in March and September). The farmers from not only Punjab, but also from neighboring states such as Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, etcetera travel to PAU campus to buy high-quality seeds, farm equipment and gain knowledge on new agricultural technologies in the two-day main fair event.

History

The university was established in 1962 to serve the state of erstwhile Punjab and was inaugurated by Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru, Prime Minister of India on July 8, 1963. Prime Minister Narendra Modi spinning a Charkha at Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana

Prime Minister Narendra Modi spinning a Charkha at Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana

Sports

Punjab Agricultural University Stadium is a multipurpose stadium located in the campus. The stadium has facilities for

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by str ...

, football,

hockey Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...

, and other sports. There is an astroturf field for hockey. In addition to this there is a swimming pool and a

velodrome A velodrome is an arena for track cycling. Modern velodromes feature steeply banked oval tracks, consisting of two 180-degree circular bends connected by two straights. The straights transition to the circular turn through a moderate easement ...

. There are facilities for indoor sports such as

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

badminton Badminton is a racquet sport played using racquets to hit a shuttlecock across a net. Although it may be played with larger teams, the most common forms of the game are "singles" (with one player per side) and "doubles" (with two players p ...

gymnastics Gymnastics is a type of sport that includes physical exercises requiring balance, strength, flexibility, agility, coordination, dedication and endurance. The movements involved in gymnastics contribute to the development of the arms, legs, s ...

, handball,

volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Sum ...

lawn tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cove ...

table tennis Table tennis, also known as ping-pong and whiff-whaff, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight ball, also known as the ping-pong ball, back and forth across a table using small solid rackets. It takes place on a hard table div ...

weight lifting Weightlifting generally refers to activities in which people lift weights, often in the form of dumbbells or barbells. People lift various kinds of weights for a variety of different reasons. These may include various types of competition; promo ...

and

Kabbadi Kabaddi is a contact team sport. Played between two teams of seven players, the objective of the game is for a single player on offence, referred to as a "raider", to run into the opposing team's half of the court, touch out as many of their ...

etc. The Ground has also hosted 10

Ranji Colonel H. H. Shri Sir Ranjitsinhji Vibhaji II, Jam Saheb of Nawanagar, (10 September 1872 – 2 April 1933), often known as Ranji or K. S. Ranjitsinhji, was the ruler of the Indian princely state of Nawanagar from 1907 to 1933, as Ma ...

including a final in

1993 File:1993 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Oslo I Accord is signed in an attempt to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; The Russian White House is shelled during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis; Czechoslovakia is peacefu ...

where

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising a ...

defeated Maharashtra to win their only Ranji Trophy title and one

Irani Trophy Irani Trophy or Irani Cup also known as the Mastercard Irani Trophy due to sponsorship reasons, is a first-class cricket tournament organised by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). . It is played annually between the winners of ...

matches from 1987 to 1999 and 10 List A matches.List A matches
/ref>

Rankings

The

National Institutional Ranking Framework The National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) is a methodology adopted by the Ministry of Education, Government of India, to rank institutions of higher education in India. The Framework was approved by the MHRD and launched by Minister ...

(NIRF) ranked Punjab Agricultural University 51 among universities in 2019.

Notable alumni

Deep Saini Hargurdeep Saini ( Punjabi: ਹਰਗੁਰਦੀਪ ਸੈਣੀ), also known as Deep Saini, is a scientist, current President and Vice-Chancellor of Dalhousie University and incoming Principal and Vice-Chancellor of McGill University. Caree ...

Jaswinder Bhalla Jaswinder Bhalla (born 4 May 1960) is an Indian actor and comedian who works in Punjabi cinema. He started his professional career as a comedian in 1988 with Chankata 88 and became actor with film Dulla Bhatti. He is best known for his comedy ...

* Gurbhajan Gill * *

Gurmant Grewal Gurmant Singh Grewal (born December 21, 1957) is an Indo-Canadian politician and former Conservative Member of Parliament. Gurmant and his wife, Nina Grewal, who represented Fleetwood—Port Kells from 2004 to 2015, were the first married co ...

* Baldev Singh Dhillon * Adesh Kanwarjit Singh Brar * * * * * Khem Singh Gill * *

References

External links

* {{Coord missing, Punjab (India) Universities in Punjab, India Education in Ludhiana Science and technology in Ludhiana 1962 establishments in East Punjab Educational institutions established in 1962