The Higher Education Department has announced that the 17 State-run universities in Karnataka will have to follow a common calendar of events from the academic year 2016–17.
The move is likely to help students get placements early as the schedule will make it mandatory for universities to announce results on time. Besides this, it will also help students to get transfer from one university to another for postgraduate studies.
Although universities had been given directions to comply with the common calendar, they had not adhered to it so far. To ensure that university officials complied with the calendar from this academic year, the department last week issued a Government Order (GO) notifying dates and the common calendar of events for undergraduate and postgraduate courses in universities.
As per the calendar of events, all State universities will have to announce the results of undergraduate courses by May 31 and those of postgraduate courses by June 30.
Warned of actionHigher Education Minister Basavaraj Rayaraddi said synchronised announcement of results had been a longstanding demand of students, and added that universities would have to fall in line from this academic year. “If universities do not comply with this calendar of events, the State government will initiate action against officials. In the long run, we are also planning to enact a law to ensure compliance,” he said.
Officials of many universities, however, said it would be difficult to “strictly” comply with the calendar of events for this academic year as mandated in the GO as they had already chalked out the key dates. For instance, although the GO states that universities would have to begin even semester UG classes (II, IV, VI, VIII) between November 21 and December 1, Bangalore University’s calendar of events states that even semester classes should start on December 19.
