Summary
Academic and administrative deadlock across campuses
- Aliah University could not apply for a NAAC accreditation, a must for any university, because it does not even have an interim vice-chancellor since mid-March.
- Rabindra Bharati University has not yet been able to announce details of its four-year undergraduate programme because it cannot convene a meeting of its highest decision-making body, executive council, without a VC.
- West Bengal State University, Barasat, has not yet decided its seat matrix to accommodate EWS students at the undergraduate level because its executive council cannot meet without a VC.
The absence of vice-chancellors at state-aided universities has crippled academic and administrative activities severely, said officials and teachers at the institutions.
An official at Aliah University said May 31 was the deadline for applying to the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) to get the institution accredited. It’s mandatory to mention the name of the VC in the application, he said.
The NAAC assesses a college or university on a number of parameters, including curriculum, teaching-learning and evaluation, research, innovations and extension, infrastructure and best practices.
Sajjad Hossain, secretary of the Aliah University Teachers’ Association, said: “The UGC has been insisting that colleges and universities get themselves accredited. But we are unable to do so in the absence of a VC. The UGC could stop our funds for this.”
Hossain is also a member of a forum called Save University, Save Education, which had on Monday called for immediate appointment of full-term VCs at all 31 state-aided universities.
Abu Taher Kamruddin, president of the West Bengal Board of Madrasah Education, had quit as interim VC of Aliah after Calcutta High Court had on March 14 set aside the state education department’s decision to appoint VCsto 24 state-aided universities because the orders did not have the approval of then governor Jagdeep Dhankhar. Kamruddin was appointed interim VC in April 2022.
The governor is ex-officio chancellor of all state-aided universities.
An official at Rabindra Bharati University said they have been functioning without a VC since June 8, 2023, the day the three-month tenure of Nirmalya Narayan Chakrabarti, a professor at the institute, as interim VC ended.
“The undergraduate admission notification has been issued without any announcement on the components and guidelines for the four-year undergraduate programme,” Debabrata Das, secretary of the RBU teachers’ association,told The Telegraph.
“These decisions need to be passed by the faculty council and the executive council. Neither of these two bodies could meet in the absence of a VC,” Das said.
None of Bengal’s 31 state-aided universities has a full-term VC.
Some are being helmed by officiating VCs, who were appointed by governor C.V. Ananda Bose in early June.
The education minister had termed the appointments “illegal”. Calcutta High Court, however, has not stayed the appointments. Aliah University, RBU and West Bengal State University, Barasat, are among the universities that do not have even an officiating VC.
An official at the Barasat university said they did not know when they could ask colleges to raise their intake capacity to accommodate students under the “economically weaker section” category.
“These decisions need to be approved by the executive council, which cannot meet in the absence of a VC,” he said.
Last updated on 06 Jul 2023
