The Syndicate of Bangalore University at its special meeting held earlier in the week accepted the report of the high-powered committee headed by Chambi Puranik, former Dean (Academics), Karnataka State Open University, that had recommended de-recognising 20 of the 29 distance education centres of the university's Directorate of Correspondence Courses and Distance Education.
The Syndicate constituted a sub-committee under the chairmanship of the Registrar to oversee the implementation of the recommendations.
The committee was set up following allegations of malpractice, particularly question paper leak, during the distance education courses examination in 2009.
No infrastructure
The committee, which inspected 29 centres, found that most had no proper infrastructure.
Of the 29 centres, the committee said, only three could be categorised as “better ones”. It said the directorate was not monitoring these centres and had recommended installation of CCTVs in the examination halls to prevent malpractice.
The university did not act on the feedback as the Higher Education Department, based on the recommendation of the Higher Education Minister, had asked it to desist.
Meanwhile, the Syndicate accepted the academic audit report for B.Ed. colleges for 2009-10 submitted by Prof. R.M. Ranganath committee.
It constituted local inquiry committees under the chairmanship of senior professors to inspect colleges seeking renewal of affiliation/starting of new courses/colleges for 2010-11.
Other decisions pertained to approval of draft statutes for interviews for selection of engineering faculty; and the Vice-Chancellor's proposed visit to the University of California, Irvine, to explore establishing institutes of excellence in nanotechnology and biotechnology, faculty exchange programmes in Chemistry, Mathematics, and Physics.
