Jaipur, July 14 -- The Rajasthan Housing Board's (RHB) Coaching Hub- country's first government-built destination for coaching institutes preparing students for competitive examinations- remains largely deserted three years after the multi-crore campus' first phase was completed. HT visited the campus days after a fire at a coaching institute in Lucknow killed 15 children, prompting authorities in Jaipur to issue notices to coaching institutes over fire safety compliance. Ironically, while thousands of students continue to attend coaching classes in congested commercial buildings and residential colonies across Jaipur, a purpose-built campus in Pratap Nagar equipped with modern infrastructure lies almost abandoned. Former RHB chairman and retired IAS officer Pawan Arora, who launched the project, believes that the project could still succeed if the government ensured that coaching institutes operating from residential areas shifted to the dedicated campus. "Most coaching institutes are functioning from buildings that violate planning and safety norms. If authorities strictly enforce the rules and ask them to vacate such premises, they will have no option but to move to the Coaching Hub, which has been built according to government standards," he said. At first glance, the Coaching Hub looks like a modern educational township waiting to welcome thousands of students. But the silence is unsettling. Today, most of the infrastructure remains unused. Instead of students, the campus is guarded by security personnel trying to prevent theft and vandalism. "It happens almost every day," one of the guards tells HT. "People break in to steal construction material or electrical wires left exposed...theft attempts have become routine." During its ground investigation, HT spoke to former and current RHB officials, coaching institute operators, investors and local residents, whose accounts suggest that the project's biggest obstacle was a disagreement over its business model. Conceived by the previous Ashok Gehlot government, the Coaching Hub was envisioned as an integrated education city where coaching institutes, hostels and student facilities would operate from a single campus. The first phase, completed in 2023, comprised eight blocks capable of accommodating around 240 coaching institutes and nearly 70,000 students. The RHB is now exploring alternative uses for the complex. Last month, the Board announced that it may allot the premises to private organisations or government departments. The RHB insisted that coaching institutes purchase commercial units, while coaching operators wanted them to be leased. However, Arora rejected suggestions that the project should have been offered on lease. "We did consider that option, but there was a genuine concern that once more than 200 institutions occupied the premises, collecting rent from each of them would become difficult. We did not want another situation where government property remained occupied while dues accumulated for years," he said. Meanwhile, Coaching institute operators, however, argue that buying commercial space worth crores of rupees is simply not viable in an uncertain business. Praveen Kumar, director of Samyak Coaching, said the coaching industry is highly volatile and depends on recruitment cycles, examination patterns and results. "No institute wants to lock crores of rupees into real estate. Leasing would have been a practical option because coaching businesses can decline unexpectedly," he said. Jitendra Kumar Meena, director of Binori Sansthan Career Institute, who invested nearly Rs.7 crore in the project said, "I believed the government's promise that this would become Jaipur's coaching destination. Today everything my family owns is mortgaged." RHB commissioner Arvind Poswal acknowledged that private coaching institutes are reluctant to purchase space and reiterated that the Board cannot offer the units on rent. "If four or five of the big players had agreed to move here, the picture would have been completely different," he said. Poswal said the project's cost had escalated significantly over the years....