Education News

Cloudy future In a judgement delivered on February 11 which has far-reaching implications, a three judge bench of the Supreme Court forced closure of 97 self-financing, private universities functioning in the state of Chattisgarh with immediate effect declaring the state law which had allowed 112 private universities to spring up in the newly demarcated (November 2000) state within one year, ultra vires. The apex court’s judgement has created consternation in the councils of several high profile varsities including Amity, Rai, Kalinga and NIILM. Suddenly the future of 30,000 students, over 1,000 faculty and a network of ancillary study centres and mini-campuses of these institutions which have been established in Haryana, Delhi and Punjab and further afield, has become cloudy. According to the Supreme Court order in Prof. Yashpal & Anr vs state of Chattisgarh & Ors, ss.5 and 6 of the Chattisgarh Private Sector Universities (Establishment and Regulation) Act 2002, enacted by the Congress government led by Ajit Jogi (voted out of office in 2004) which empowered the state government to incorporate and establish universities through a mere gazette notification and to set up more than one campus anywhere in the country with prior (discretionary) approval, were unconstitutional. The court upheld the petition filed by educationist and former UGC chairman Prof. Yashpal who challenged the Act alleging that it “allowed sub-standard institutes to flourish”. Immediately after it assumed office in June 2004 the new BJP government led by chief minister Raman Singh conducted a review of all private universities in the state, and denotified 60 of the 97 for lack of infrastructure and abysmal academic standards. Far from being chastened, several hole-in-the-wall institutions transformed into full-fledged universities by executive fiat, challenged the denotification in the apex court. But with the Supreme Court’s ruling denotifying even major private universities such as Amity, Rai and MATS which had made substantial investments in infrastructure and campuses in Chattisgarh, chief minister Raman Singh pleaded with the Union HRD ministry that at least “better private bodies with good infrastructure be allowed to function”. With the future of over 30,000 students, many of whom have paid relatively high (by government aided college standards) up-front registration and tuition fees in jeopardy, the HRD ministry has roped in the University Grants Commission (UGC) to constitute a committee to safeguard the interests of affected students enrolled in affiliated study centres of the derecognised universities across India. The committee will visit these campuses beyond Chattisgarh to ascertain if they can be classified as undergraduate education campuses in the light of the Supreme Court’s definition of the word ‘university’. In other words, the ministry will evaluate the denotified private varsities as “chain of colleges” located in different states. “The idea,” elaborates S.P. Sharma, one of the affected teachers of Amity University, Chattisgarh, “is that the nearest UGC recognised university having territorial jurisdiction over the area will take them under its wing.” For instance, the Amity study centres in Noida could be brought under the jurisdiction of Meerut University while those in Gurgaon could be clubbed with…