Willing to set aside 10 per cent of their seats for weaker sections

In Chennai the Federation of Associations of Managements of Unaided Professional Educational Institutions of India on 24th Oct 05 urged the Centre to amend Private Professional Educational Institutions (Regulation of admissions and fixation of fee) Bill, 2005, to allow them to fill all seats on the basis of merit in Plus-Two or equivalent examination. President V. Malakonda Reddy told presspersons that though the Supreme Court, in its October 2002 judgment, had allowed unaided professional colleges to fill all seats, they were willing to set apart some seats to the weaker sections. Sathyabama Deemed University Chancellor Jeppiar said the unaided colleges were prepared to set aside 10 per cent of the seats for weaker sections if the number of seats were increased correspondingly. They should be allowed to follow eligibility norms of the All-India Council for Technical Education for admissions at the national level. Though a mere pass in Standard XII was sufficient, candidates would be admitted only on the basis of merit. Mr. Reddy said every unaided professional college should have the freedom to fix its fee structure. A self-regulatory system should be evolved. These colleges should be allowed to admit wards of Non-Resident Indians, People of Indian origin and foreign students on a supernumerary basis over and above the intake. The federation sought inclusion of its representatives in the official committee to draft the proposed legislation for regulating admissions and fixing fees. It appointed a nine-member panel to represent its views to the Union Human Resource Development Minister, Members of Parliament and officials concerned. Federation representatives had met the Union Human Resource Development Minister in New Delhi on October 18 and highlighted the demands of the unaided colleges.

News of Management

In a move directed against the educational. institutions having sub-standard facilities, the governor and chancellor of U.P.state universities, T. V Rajeshwar Rao, cancelled the affiliation of 20 B. Ed and two other colleges with the Chaudhary Charan Singh University, Meerut. These colleges reportedly did not follow the university norms and lacked the required facilities to run their courses. In his new order, issued on Monday, the chancellor refused to accept the proposal of two new B.Ed colleges in Noida and Ghaziabad and also turned down the proposals of DAV College in Muzaffarnagar and one in Baghpat to start new courses of Microbiology, Biotechnology and Arts. The governor has so far cancelled the affiliation of 22 Colleges in the region. The chancellor has also ordered an enquiry of all 150 B. Ed colleges affiliated to the CCS University A team of administrative and university officials had carried out an investigation and identified 70 colleges that were substandard and flouting university norms. The list was sent to the governor by the commissioner of Meerut division, Mohinder Singh, who had recently taken charge as the officiating Vice Chancellor of the University The governor had sacked the then VC R.P. Singh on charges of corruption. The investigative team found that many of these colleges were being run in two rooms. Besides, few had submitted fake documents of land deeds and had admitted students in excess of their management quota. Some were even charging extra money for these admissions. In fact, opening B.Ed colleges had become a lucrative profession for many who even converted their factory sheds into colleges with a profit motive. This also led to a huge spike in the number of B.Ed colleges in the region. Most of these colleges openly flouted the university norms.

News

Even as the nation is coping with catastrophic earthquakes in rapid succession, the plan to create a research institute dedicated exclusively for seismology appears to be in limbo two years after the conception of such an institute. The future of the proposed Institute of Seismology Research (ISR) in Gujarat declared a priority in the aftermath of the Bhuj earthquake is in jeopardy as the lone scientist recruited to head it has resigned and the state government has not appointed anybody else to run the show. No land has been acquired yet to set up the institute and the timeframe for utilising a World Bank loan of Rs 30 crore to kickstart the ISR has also elapsed. Mooted at an Indian Science Congress session and accepted by the Department of Science and Technology, the institute was to be located in Gujarat under the states administrative control. Dr Janardan G Negi, an emeritus scientist at the National Geophysical Research Institute in Hyderabad was appointed director-general in July 2003 and was entrusted the responsibility of creating the institute. But he resigned in September 2004.

Lone battle

I was a one-man army Though I waited for 15 months, no scientific staff was recruited. Also the bulk of the financial assistance, which was supposed to have come from the DST, never arrived, Dr Negi, who now heads the Madhya Pradesh Council of Science and Technology in Bhopal, said. Dr Negi, however, framed rules and regulations, readied an architectural plan for the building, purchased equipment to run an observatory network and prepared a brochure to popularise the institute. We wanted to make it a world-class institute. But the Centres support never came, though the state fulfilled its 20 per cent commitment, he said. The only positive outcome is that the ISR purchased digital seismographs and installed them in 20 locations to create a state-wide network. But without the institute, its up to the states science department to make the network functional, Dr Negi said. Its definitely a loss as the country needs more seismologists. Trained researchers can help in hazard estimation and disaster warnings, said Dr D K Paul, who heads the earthquake engineering division at IIT, Roorkee.

News of IIT and ISR

Having produced a good number of quality engineers in the past five decades, Jadavpur University is making a foray into the field of management education. We are already recognized as one of Indias finest engineering institutions and have decided to introduce management courses to open better placement avenues for our engineers, Partha Pratim Biswas, a member of the universitys executive council, said on Monday. The university has been deemed fit by the Centre to be upgraded to an IIT and has already been declared a centre of excellence. It decided last week to go ahead with its latest expansion plan. An increasing demand from students has prompted the university authorities to take the decision. A meeting of the universitys faculty council was held recently to finalise ways of implementing the scheme. The authorities of All-India Council for Technical Education have given their nod to the University for starting management courses. The university is determined to achieve a unique position in the field of producing efficient management cadre, stated Biswas. To this end, its management courses will not be Similelar to those offered by management institutes like the IIMs. There wont be courses in personnel management, marketing management or finance management. Instead, the modules will be targeted exclusively at graduate and postgraduate engineers. For example, the university already runs a course on food technology. Among many other areas, we have a plan to open a course on food and nutrition management, said a university official. The university runs bachelors degree courses in several other subjects, like construction engineering and electrical engineering. We wish to introduce corresponding courses in construction management and power management, the officer explained. To compete with existing institutions imparting management education, the university is going in for a high-standard infrastructure and experienced faculty members. A considerable portion of National Instruments the sick unit being taken over by the university will be utilized to run the management programmes. Both full-time and part- time courses will be offered. There will be evening courses for employed engineers. Initially, the courses will be at postgraduate level. Full-time undergraduate courses will be introduced later.
News

Former vice-chancellor of Nalanda open university, Dr B N Agrawal, launched two new professional courses, offered by Madurai kamraj university (MKU), which would be taught through arcade business college here on 4 oct. The courses, post-graduate diploma in mass communication and journalism, and ma in mass communication and journalism, are of one-year and two-year duration, respectively. Introducing the courses, Dr Agrawal said mkus professional courses, taught under its distance education programme, will be very helpful to the students of this state. Speaking at the function, former director of Patna university distance education, R R Sahay, said the irregular academic sessions of the universities of Bihar had compelled students to join such professional courses. Underlining the importance of these courses, former pro vice-chancellor of Magadh University, Major Balbir Singh Bhasin, said journalism must include moral values in its fold. Director of the college, Ashish kumar, said the college was already teaching a three-year degree course in mass communication and the newly launched courses (which were of postgraduate level) would further widen the scope for employment to students. He said regular classes would be held for all the courses and examinations for them would be held in Patna. The last date for admission to the new courses was October 31, he added.

News of launched two new professional courses

Justice Arun Tan-don of Allahabad High Court on 4 Oct quashed the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) Amendment Act, 1981, which provides that AMU is a minority institution, setting the stage for yet another politically charged controversy round of quotas in educational institutions and putting what has traditionally been a politically divisive issue back on the front burner. The verdict was in response to a petition challenging AMUs recent decision to reserve 50% tof its seats for Muslims. The court termed the decision of the AMU academic council, endorsed by the HRD ministry through a notification on February 25 reserving 50% of seats in postgraduate courses, illegal. Unlike in the case of the Supreme Courts ruling that the existing law does not provide room for reservations in professional courses in unaided private institutions when the political class closed its ranks, the AMU case brought out the sharp divisions that its minority character has historically generated. The BJP and CPI welcomed the order saying that the court had upheld their stand against communal quota in educational institutions. The Congress, however, resisted being drawn out. The court held the AMU (Amendment) Act, 1981 was itself illegal, therefore AMU was not a minority institution. The academic council of AMU too had reserved 50% seats for Muslims, which too has been declared illegal by the court. The admissions made in pursuance of the said reservation policy has been declared illegal. The court passed this order on a writ petition of one Malay Shukla

News of AMU

The syllabi of all the 21 B Tech courses being offered by the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU) and its affiliated colleges have been revised, making them more industry oriented. The university has also revised the syllabi of MTech, MBA and MCA. The revised syllabus will come into effect from the current academic year for the first year students, followed by the second year students in 2006-2007 academic year and third and fourth year students in the subsequent two academic years. The revised syllabus of all courses has been hosted on the university web site www.jntu.ac.in . Students can download it from October 1, 2005 onwards. Major changes in BTech courses include introduction of workshop, introduction of English communication skills, preparation of industry oriented mini project, students presentation on a project at a seminar and internal examination including both objective type and subjective type of question papers.

News of Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University