The recently unveiled University Grants Commission’s Draft Regulations, which seeks to list the Anna University, University of Madras and Madurai Kamaraj University in ‘Category II’, have not gone down well among a section of academics in Tamil Nadu. These universities were put in ‘Category II’ as they did not participate in the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) in 2016,
Consequently, under the proposed new regulations these universities would have limited autonomy and be required to seek UGC’s approval for a wide range of activities.
Anna University’s former Vice-Chancellors M. Anandakrishnan and E. Balagurusamy say it is unfair to punish universities when participation in the NIRF was supposed to be voluntary.
“When NIRF was evolved, they (MHRD) did not say that participation was essential for ranking. The data furnished by institutions is not reliable as they are not verified or authenticated. To categorise a university based on that unreliable data is highly questionable,” said Prof. Anandakrishnan.
Prof. Balagurusamy terms it wrong for the UGC to snatch a university’s autonomy. Such a move would destroy the university’s reputation internationally. “AICTE and UGC give grants. I refused to participate in any kind of ranking system. There are a lot of missing links and it is difficult to take ranks seriously,” he said.
University of Madras former Vice-Chancellor S.P. Thyagarajan, who was a member of the UGC committee that drafted regulations in 2009, feels it is too early to use the NIRF data to categorise universities.
Since NAAC would be using new methods to assess institutions in the coming weeks, the UGC should provide sufficient time to institutions to showcase their strengths, he said.
A former professor of Madurai Kamaraj University S. Krishnaswamy said denial of financial and academic autonomy in the name of categorisation would lead to “untouchability and enforcing elitist nature to the process of education. The genuineness of the process is under question as the Commission was seeking feedback on regulations for deemed universities already published in the July 2016 Gazette,” he said.
The Madras University Teachers Association pointed out that the NIRF had no parameter to assess knowledge advancement or social extension. Its general secretary G. Ravindran said the Commission, till now a regulator, had overstepped its limits, as higher education is in the concurrent list of Constitution. The academicians are against making NET/SLET mandatory for enrolling in a PhD programme. “It would ring the death knell for candidates from marginalised and historically disadvantaged sections of society, ” said Prof. Krishnaswamy.
