Dharmendra Pradhan writes to Union Education Minister for safeguarding interests of students in Odisha

Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has urged the Central government to intervene to safeguard the interests of students and faculty of Universities across Odisha.

Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has urged the Central government to intervene to safeguard the interests of students and faculty of Universities across Odisha. He said that the amendment of law through an ordinance by the state government has stripped the academic institutions of their autonomy. On September 4, the state government had passed the ordinance to amend the Odisha Universities Act, 1989 without any discussion in the state Assembly, the Union Petroleum and Steel Minister Pradhan said in a letter to Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank.

"The "unprecedented" amendment seeks to completely upend the higher education ecosystem in the state and has been criticised by its academic community for the drastic and regressive changes," Pradhan said.

He further said that he has received a representation from two academicians, who have contended that the amendment has stripped the Universities of their autonomy by bringing them under the government's Higher Education Department. 

The universities' apex body - the senate - has been replaced with the bureaucratic syndicate which will effectively be run by government-appointed nominees, while the appointment of vice-chancellor has been restricted by the forced entry of a nominee in the search committee, Pradhan said in the letter.

Other than this, the academic sancity of staff appointments has been disturbed by force recruitment of professors, assistant professors and other faculty through Odisha Public Service Commission and non-teaching staff through State Selection Board and not through the selection committee headed by the vice-chancellor concerned, he said.

Removal of the provision of tabling the university audit report in the Assembly has crippled the constitutional process of discussion and scrutiny of the utilisation of funds, he said.

"These changes are in contradiction with extant practices in other states and with Education being a concurrent subject, incongruous with Central Government policies," Pradhan said in the letter.

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