The Supreme Court on Monday expressed serious concern over certain institutions admitting students without obtaining recognition or affiliation from any university and ruining their career.
A Bench of Justice Dalveer Bhandari and Justice A.K. Patnaik, hearing the petition relating to deemed universities asked Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam to examine and respond to this issue by next week.
Justice Bhandari, who had earlier asked the Centre whether there was any need for deemed universities, again wanted it to go into this issue.
Mr. Subramaniam said the Prof. Tandon Committee and the Committee set up by the University Grants Commission to review the status of deemed universities had examined this issue and sought time for filing the report and affidavit.
Justice Bhandari also asked the SG to find out whether the concept of deemed university was prevalent in the U.S. or other foreign countries. Justice Bhandari recalled an order passed by his Bench regarding admission of students made by a dental college without affiliation or recognition and said the students continued the studies for two years. Though the court had ordered compensation to them, it was difficult to recover the amount from such fly-by-night institutions, he said and wanted the government to come out with proper guidelines and parameters.
The Bench was hearing a public interest petition filed by advocate Viplav Sharma in 2006 seeking regulation of deemed universities. Sanjay Hegde, counsel for the petitioner, said that all deemed universities were not bad and “there are some good deemed universities.” The court asked counsel to render assistance to find out whether deemed universities existed outside India. The Bench directed that the matter be listed for further hearing on January 18.
