25 per cent of annual grant will be slashed if varsities do not submit
their crucial records to the regulator on time
Universities which don't share information with the higher education
regulator — University Grants Commission — despite several reminders and
extension of deadlines, may have "bad days" ahead. The apex higher
education body has decided to punish such varsities by reducing their financial
aid.
Universities could now lose up to 25 per cent of their annual
grant-in-aid if they failed to provide the required information to the UGC,
according to the new regulation 'UGC Furnishing of Information by Universities –
2015'.
With the regulation coming into effect last month, every university has
to furnish exhaustive information annually on or before the UGC-specified
deadline. There are nearly 318 state universities, 129 deemed to be
universities and over 35,000 colleges under the purview of the UGC.
"Most varsities dither on sharing information with the apex body,
due to sheer ignorance or absence of any provision of penalty for not doing so
and also to hide certain facts and irregularities," a top UGC official
said.
The required information includes updated copies of rules and reports of
inspection of colleges and status of their accreditation, total staff strength
in different categories, teacher student
ratio, statistics of students admitted below minimum qualification and
results of examinations division-wise.
In addition, the universities have to submit the minimum working days,
the number of days of actual teaching, for admission tests a note on the
minimum criteria along with
admission policy.
The annual information report should include the status of compliance
with UGC regulations, status of off-campus centres, self-financing courses
offered, teaching-non-teaching staff ratio, position of vacancies and
innovation in academics, research and management.
Most universities seek to ignore the UGC's notifications with many of
them not even complying orders issued by the regulator.
"With the regulation, the UGC has got some teeth. We can now hope
to streamline the higher education sector which has been marred into large scale
irregularities, fake institutes and study centres, poor quality of affiliated
colleges. This would also force lethargic universities to put their act
together," said a UGC official.
Source |
Daily News Analysis | 17 August 2015
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