The government has asked top central universities to complete the accreditation process.
The issue came up at a conference of the vice chancellors of central universities chaired by HRD minister Kapil Sibal where there was “unanimous agreement regarding the need for accreditation of the varsities to advance academic quality and act as examples for the higher education sector in India,” said a HRD Ministry statement.
The development assumes significance given the fact that National Accreditation Regulatory Authority Bill, which mandates all institutes to seek accreditation, is stuck in Parliament, hampering government’s aim to ensure quality.
Central universities like Delhi University, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jamila Milia Islamia are some of the prestigious universities among others who are not accredited so far.
Providing benefit to the students, the meet also agreed to collaborate on student mobility by way of credit sharing, as well as sharing of courses between universities, faculty etc.
The problems faced by the Central Universities especially with regard to filling up the vacant faculty positions and autonomy regarding allocation of faculty posts was deliberated upon.
According to the statement, it was agreed that while individual problems could be settled through internal mechanisms, common problems like absence of pension portability under the national pension scheme in the central universities set up after 2004 could be taken up at the level of Government.
The central universities agreed to implement uniform accounting standard as recommended by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI).
All India Muslim Personal Law Board of Assam demanded immediate amendment to the Right to Education Act, Wakf Bill and Direct Taxes Code Bill among others.
The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has published the key of National Talent Search Examination (NTSE) 2012 recently.
T.S. Sridhar, Additional Chief Secretary, Higher Education Department, Government of Tamil Nadu has said Tamil Nadu is a front-runner in providing free education at the launch of the counseling for 2012-13 B. Tech admission at SASTRA University. He further said, in Tamil Nadu free education is offered at the school level and now being extended to higher education
NTPC Limited has recently signed MoU with IIT Delhi. The Maharatna Company aims to encourage its employees to acquire higher qualification; develop research skills and accomplish scientific studies for the development in energy sector.
All India Council for Technical Education has filed a plea in the Madras High court, seeking to stay a single judge’s order directing it to consider a request of a private college for grant of extension of approval despite the CBI filing cases against it.
For non-resident children Indian the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) plans to hold a common management admission test (CMAT) abroad. AICTE chairman Dr SS Mantha said since the first CMAT in February 2012, many prospective students abroad have been enquiring about it. “We have 3,800 management schools across the country. We will target the Gulf countries which have a good strength of Indians. Eventually, we will focus on US and Europe also,” he said.
A delegation of trustees from the Gujrat state government met All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) chairman S S Mantha for clearing the 3,800 engineering seats which were kept on hold last month.
Following the RTE act, surprisingly the top CBSE schools registered a lukewarm response on the first day of Right to Education free admission. The top private CBSE schools received a poor response from applicants, whereas some state schools where education is already free are already oversubscribed.
To ensure safety of school children that use the school transport , the Central board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has modified its affiliation bye-laws to include transport precautions.
