With the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) administration making student’s attendance mandatory from the next semester, the political factions and student organisations are seemingly more worried than the common students.
Senior students and faculty members said student organisations are the only ones, which would be “worst-hit” by this decision. As the mandatory attendance rule will substantially reduce the number of students participating their protests and political movements.
“Now the common student will think twice before accompanying them, as hardly anybody would like to join the protest-call given by student organisations and union for the sake of their attendance,” said a senior faculty, on condition of anonymity.
Soon after the circular, both left-ruled JNU students’ Union (JNUSU) and right wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) registered their protest against it. While JNUSU alleged that it’s not logical for students of MPhil and PhD to sign attendance register on daily basis and at JNU both professors and students majorly involve themselves in projects. It said that the idea of not having an attendance system was to encourage both teachers and students to evolve methods for effective teaching and participation in class.
Students said that the fear that grips the JNUSU and left parties has also engulfed ABVP. “In JNU, there are very few students who support the ABVP. If attendance is made compulsory, they will find none and their support base will further shrink,” said a PhD scholar.
The JNUSU has called an emergency council meeting on the issue to decide on the future course of action.
Meanwhile, a Councillor of School of Environmental Sciences (SES) JNU writes to the Vice-Chancellor against the move. “In our science schools, we stay late in the labs at night due to planned work schedules, sometimes the instruments are not available during the day hours which bring us to this conclusion, that there are not straight working hours for us,” the councillor said in his letter.
However, Hari Ram Mishra, Associate Professor at Special Centre for Sanskrit Studies, said the period of the research students, who are on field-trips or at library and elsewhere for research work, is usually considered present.