[Marxistindia] Stop Dismantling UGC

[news from the cpi(m)]

June 30, 2018

Press Statement

 

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the
following statement:

 

Stop Dismantling UGC Mindlessly

 

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) firmly opposes
the move by the present Central Government to replace University Grants
Commission through proposed Higher Education Commission of India (repeal of
University Grants Commission Act 2018).  

 

It is clear that the government is in a tearing hurry to push through the
proposed legislation in the monsoon session of the Parliament with only ten
days earmarked for discussion and receiving feedbacks on the draft Bill.
Despite using the repeated rhetoric of `minimum government, maximum
governance', the draft proposes a scheme of further centralization of the
government's role in vesting itself with the powers of  distribution of
grants. The emphasis is on overregulation with shift towards outcomes
divorced from the academic process involved.  The move is also aimed at
further commercialization while adopting a `one size fit all' approach.  

 

Despite limitations, the UGC had some autonomy with  academics being at the
helm of affairs; but in the proposed legislation that fig leaf is abandoned
and the entire process will be taken over by the bureaucracy and the
political masters of the government itself.  

 

Any move which is so momentous for the nation cannot be rushed through with
such unthinking speed. The Polit Bureau demands that the proposed Bill be
immediately withdrawn  as has been demanded by several organisations  which
are stakeholders in the future of higher education in this country.  

 

 

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