UGC standing panel on DU to meet at 4 pm today

The standing committee set up by the University Grants Commission to advise Delhi University to scrap the four-year under-graduate programme and revert to the three-year course will meet here Monday at 4 p.m., said a committee member.

The commission Saturday constituted the standing committee headed by the UGC vice chairman with representatives from the academic and executive councils of DU, Delhi University Teachers Association (DUTA), Delhi University Students Union (DUSU), college principals and teachers to advise the varsity on change-over. 

"We have a standing committee meeting at 4 p.m. today (Monday) at the UGC where we will discuss strategies for the migration to the three-year programme," Nandita Narain, DUTA pesident, told IANS.

After several letters to the varsity, the commission Sunday ordered the Delhi University that it should make admissions for the under-graduate courses only under the three-year programme, which was prevalent prior to the introduction of the four-year programme (FYUP), or face action under the UGC Act, 1956.

As the four-year programme introduced last year violates the National Education Policy 1986, which advocates the 10+2+3 system, the commission said that DU must go back to the earlier system.

The commission has also ordered the varsity to comply with the letter "without fail" by Monday.

With no comment from the varsity, confusion has gripped the campus on whether admissions would go through as scheduled from Tuesday. 

A left student group protested outside the ministry of human resource development (MHRD) office, asking Minister Smriti Irani to intervene and speed up the process of transition.

"Now the minister has to talk. We have heard that the colleges are conducting their admission committee meetings and are not discussing the UGC letter at all. Today (Monday) it is crucial that minister intervenes," Sunny, president of All India Student's Union, told IANS.