It has been almost a month since Delhi University opened its gates to around 58,000 students — the first batch to study the much discussed Choice Based Credit System.
The teachers’ union continue to consistently oppose it, while the All India Students’ Association held a rally on Friday. Why is the CBCS — introduced by the Ministry of Human Resource Development in its Central universities is being so ill-received?
“The Choice Based Credit System operates on the system of choice. However, we do not have the resources to offer many choices to our students. The same lack of classrooms, faculty and other issues that made the defunct four-year undergraduate programme difficult to deliver is now affecting the Choice Based Credit System,” explains Saikat Ghosh, a faculty member in Khalsa College. Ghosh had consistently opposed the FYUP.
The agitation to remove the FYUP had united all political forces on campus, making the withdrawal itself based on pure inefficiencies and free from any political agenda. However, the now almost same syllabus that the CBCS envisions has the teachers more worried.
“The teachers in the university no longer have a choice when it comes to making the syllabus. We are reduced to school teachers, teaching State-prescribed textbooks and of course open to any agenda that the political party in power wants to enforce,” says Sunny Kumar, a member of the AISA, which still continues giving out pamphlets containing information about the CBCS and carrying out referendums even though nobody seems to be listening.
Physics Teacher Abha Dev Habib, one of more vociferous opponents of the FYUP feels that the CBCS is almost a replica of the FYUP. “There are similarities in structure and the cafeteria-approach to giving an education,” she says.
Another popular argument is that the local issues in each subject are being ignored when there is a uniform course being followed throughout the country. A history student could be deprived of any local history that his or her State is proud of and a syllabus based on student profiles would soon be a thing of the past, with every university being given the power to amend only 30 per cent of its syllabus to suit their needs.
No department can claim to be superior or have a course structure different from anything else you would find in the country, defeating the purpose of being better and competitive.
Another worrisome factor is that several materials pending from the FYUP are being introduced in DU. The course was known for its “schoolish syllabus”, that bordered on the ridiculous, say teachers.
“Another thing is the haste with which it was introduced. A pan-India change in the structure of university functioning was introduced on April 10 and within one or two months classes began,” adds Ms. Habib.
“When major systemic changes are rushed without proper preparation, particularly with large universities such as DU, the result is chaos, confusion and adverse consequences for thousands of students. The illegalities associated with a forced implementation of CBCS from July 2015 is now threatening to destroy Delhi University and ruin the careers of lakhs of students,” added DUTA president Nandita Narain, adding that they had written to all authorities — the VC, the UGC, the Visitor and the MHRD — urging withdrawal of the CBCS on grounds of it being unsuited to public-funded universities, given their lack of infrastructure and teachers and their social mandate.
