History

The Department of Environmental Science, first established as Environmental Research Unit in 1978, was raised to the status of an academic department in March, 1980 for teaching and research in Environmental science. Originally it was a research department having only the Ph. D. programme. In 1986, the department introduced one year M. Phil programme in Environmental Science (Physical) with specializations in Environmental Meteorology, Environmental Pollution and Environmental Geophysics and since then it was continued up to 2000. In 2001, the department started M. Sc. in Environmental Science in semester system. However, the M. Phil programme is kept abeyance for the time being. Now the department has been grown to a full fledged Postgraduate teaching and research department. The department has a plan to introduce new revised M. Sc. syllabus from the next session with specialization in Environmental Pollution – monitoring and control and Natural Hazards.

Originally, the Department was housed in a room in the Department of Physics and then it was shifted to an old Assam Type House behind Botany Building. In 2000, the Department got a new RCC Building of its own which was extended recently. However, the space in the new building is not sufficient and the chemical laboratory of the department is still in the old Assam Type House.

Up till now, the department has produced 18 Ph. D, 62 M. Phil and three batches of M. Sc. in the subject. Moreover, the subject has already been introduced as an elective subject at the three years degree course in the university.

Heads of the Department

• Dr. Suryya Kanta Sarmah, (July 1979 - February 1994)
• Dr. Dulal Chandra Goswami (I/C), (March 1994 - May 1995)
• Dr. Sarbeswar Kalita, (June 1995 - October 1995)
• Dr. Dulal Chandra Goswami, (November 1995 - May 2003)
• Dr. Sarbeswar Kalita, (June 2003 - May 2006)
• Dr. Hari Prasad Sarma, (June 2006 - Contd.)