Assault on souls of Universities
Nurturing the false pride of ‘we had this long ago’ is India developing a mindset to destroy everything that we got today? India was on the forefront of technology in the past and had achieved great feats in the field of education through the pages of history, are the ‘neo cultural’ pundits of India turning into a roadblock for India to grow into the future? Education policy is the best example to show how India is on downhill journey with its scientific and rational approach to the future.
The believers of Hindutva are posing a massive challenge to growth of intellectualism, by tampering with the educational policy. The so called upholders of culture, often shed crocodile tears about how the invaders destroyed the Nalanda University way back in 1193. This often finds its way into public speeches that Prime Minister Modi delivers at frequent intervals. His government is working stealthily on destroying the post-independence universities of India.
On one hand this government is working on uprooting the modern universities at the cost of glorifying the historical legacy of the country. All the steps initiated to change the UGC that existed since 1956 into HECU, need to be noted. Immediately after, the yet-to-be set up Jio University sponsored by Mukesh Ambani was given Institute of Excellence, along with six other institutes. These are the biggest mistakes that can turn detrimental for India’s educational future. We need to also know HECU would operate.
The government will have all rights to withdraw the power of any university that disobeys the government diktats. The VCs and management heads of the educational institutions can be subjected to disciplinary action or three years of punishment if they fail to pay heed to the government. UGC had the powers to control the allocation of funds, but in the new body that is being constituted can only keep an eye on quality control, of course, with the prior permission of the government.
HRD ministry will have direct control over the funds that flow to institutes. As per the 1956 Act when the UGC came into existence, at least 50% of the members had to be from outside the government, from fields such as agriculture, forests, medicine or law and so on. But HECI will only have members that are nominated by the government.
It is not as though UGC was without faults, since the Commission had at times allowed practices to be taken up by the Universities that were against the interest of the students on several occasions. For instance, the ever changing syllabus and exam practices of Delhi University had subjected the students to a lot of problems. The university has switched from annual exam to semester system and then back again to annual exam pattern when students retaliated against this.
The UGC had also directed the Delhi University to engage 20 teaching hours over the existing 12 hour teaching time. Do the students have the bandwidth to listen to over 18 hour classes? Have the members or policy makers or politicians even understood how much time it takes to prepare for one hour class?
With all this, the anticipated changes that HECI would bring in, are already mired in problems. This would only help the rich universities that aspire to become top universities, one of those dreams the government is chasing right now. Even the students and teachers will choose such institutes over the others and public money will be given in large parts, including pumping of private funds only to these universities. In this ordeal, colleges and universities with lack of facilities would be sidelined.
As of now, India has 760 universities and 38,498 colleges. Among the 1.56 million students, over 80% are going to degree level classes the ones who opt for higher level of education are just about 0.67% of them. Even when the government is speaking about privatization of education, at least 78% are private institutes. What plans does the government have for these institutes and their students? By creating ‘renowned’ and ‘non-autonomous’ categories, the government is pushing most of them into second grade categories. The government assumes the students have to be controlled, and not be let off to have a liberal mindset.
This is much against the thought of ‘Where the mind is without fear and head is held high; and the knowledge is free…’ The government is trying to put a massive control mechanism over young minds, by attacking the souls of universities. This is worse than whatever was unleashed on the Nalanda university in the annals of history.
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Trouble ‘Miyas’ everywhere only then they will leave Assam: Himanta Biswa Sarma
Says “Himanta Biswa Sarma, BJP are openly against them, we are saying it openly
New Delhi: Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Tuesday said that four to five lakh “Miya voters” would be removed from the electoral rolls in the state once the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter lists is carried out. He also made a series of controversial remarks openly targeting the Miya community, a term commonly used in Assam in a derogatory sense to refer to Bengali-speaking Muslims.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an official programme in Digboi in Tinsukia district, Sarma said it was his responsibility to create difficulties for the Miya community and claimed that both he and the BJP were “directly against Miyas”.
“Four to five lakh Miya votes will have to be deleted in Assam when the SIR happens,” Sarma said, adding that such voters “should ideally not be allowed to vote in Assam, but in Bangladesh”. He asserted that the government was ensuring that they would not be able to vote in the state.
The chief minister was responding to questions about notices issued to thousands of Bengali-speaking Muslims during the claims and objections phase of the ongoing Special Revision (SR) of electoral rolls in Assam. While the Election Commission is conducting SIR exercises in 12 states and Union Territories, Assam is currently undergoing an SR, which is usually meant for routine updates.
Calling the current SR “preliminary”, Sarma said that a full-fledged SIR in Assam would lead to large-scale deletion of Miya voters. He said he was unconcerned about criticism from opposition parties over the issue.
“Let the Congress abuse me as much as they want. My job is to make the Miya people suffer,” Sarma said. He claimed that complaints filed against members of the community were done on his instructions and that he had encouraged BJP workers to keep filing complaints.
“I have told people wherever possible they should fill Form 7 so that they have to run around a little and are troubled,” he said, adding that such actions were meant to send a message that “the Assamese people are still living”.
In remarks that drew further outrage, Sarma urged people to trouble members of the Miya community in everyday life, claiming that “only if they face troubles will they leave Assam”. He also accused the media of sympathising with the community and warned journalists against such coverage.
“So you all should also trouble, and you should not do news that sympathise with them. There will be love jihad in your own house.” He said.
The comments triggered reactions from opposition leaders. Raijor Dal president and MLA Akhil Gogoi said the people of Assam had not elected Sarma to keep one community under constant pressure. Congress leader Aman Wadud accused the chief minister of rendering the Constitution meaningless in the state, saying his remarks showed a complete disregard for constitutional values.
According to the draft electoral rolls published on December 27, Assam currently has 2.51 crore voters. Election officials said 4.78 lakh names were marked as deceased, 5.23 lakh as having shifted, and 53,619 duplicate entries were removed during the revision process. Authorities also claimed that verification had been completed for over 61 lakh households.
On January 25, six opposition parties the Congress, Raijor Dal, Assam Jatiya Parishad, CPI, CPI(M) and CPI(M-L) submitted a memorandum to the state’s chief electoral officer. They alleged widespread legal violations, political interference and selective targeting of genuine voters during the SR exercise, describing it as arbitrary, unlawful and unconstitutional.
