Mumbai University has announced in its perspective plans that it will not grant affiliation to any new college in the 2015-16 academic year. According to a senior university official, “Since, handling huge number of colleges is becoming difficult for the university; thus, the perspective plan says there will be no new colleges in the coming academic session.”
According to the plan document, there are over 700 colleges that are affiliated to Mumbai University and are in need for skill-based programmes in the existing institutes to make students employable. However, this will need the approval of the academic council and the university senate.
The state government had appointed three committees of higher education in 2010, of which one was meant to look at the sub-division of universities. Thus, identifying the need for sub-division of big universities, the committee has recommended that Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur universities should immediately have a main campus or campuses in the suburbs and districts.
The plan document clearly states: “A large number of students and affiliated colleges have a huge administrative workload and evaluation functions, as a result of which there is a lowering of standard in terms of level of curriculum, their relevance of higher education, quality and standards. Thus, the basis for sub-division is for the need of quality and relevance of higher education, both for PG and UG courses.”
MU academicians further asserted that the National Knowledge Commission had suggested having one university for every 150 affiliated colleges and that the state government needed to seriously consider such recommendations.
