‘Occupy UGC’ stir spreads across India

Members of the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union and other students’ organisations protest outside the University Grants Commission (UGC) office in New Delhi on Monday against scrapping of fellowships awarded to non-National Eligibility Test (NET) research scholars.— Photo: Sandeep Saxena

The ‘Occupy UGC’ protest against the University Grants Commission (UGC) decision to stop non-NET fellowships is receiving students support from across the country.

After the recent agitation in Mumbai and Aligarh, students have now staged protests at the UGC’s regional offices in Kolkata, Allahabad, Pune and Varanasi on Monday.

In Delhi, students from Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi University, Jamia Millia Islamia and Ambedkar University observed Monday as ‘National Protest Day’ as they protested against the UGC’s decision to raise the sitting fee of its members from Rs. 20,000 to Rs. 50,000 in the same meeting where they cited fund crunch as the reason to stop non-NET fellowships.

“Protests were organised across universities in Delhi and other parts of the country. We have got massive response from the students, which shows that the community is not being fooled by the MHRD’s diversionary tactics against the movement,” said Sucheta De, a protester in Delhi.

“The UGC has been talking about the resource crunch due to which they decided to discontinue the non-NET fellowships. However, this excuse fell flat on their face when in the same meeting the UGC decided to increase the sitting fee of its members from Rs. 20,000 to Rs. 50,000 per month. We are going to publicise this and hold the MHRD and UGC accountable,” she added.

An MHRD order dated October 28 had refused to commit to continuing the fellowship. The terms of reference of the committee had mentioned that economic and other criteria would be considered before offering the scholarship, a decision which the protesters refused.

“The ‘Occupy UGC’ movement has time and again said that only the non-exclusionary criteria in giving fellowship will be accepted. Research scholar have to go through a screening test in every university. Why does the UGC/MHRD need to impose any other criterion in giving the fellowships? This is nothing but an attempt to justify fund cut in higher education. The committee is non-committal about extending the fellowship to all State universities or increasing the amount,” another protester said.