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Latest News |
| 19th
January 2010 / Business Standard |
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Govt introduces steps to help AICTE
clean up its act
The regulatory body may eventually be superseded by a
higher body. In the interim period, govt is introducing
a host of measures to ensure transparency and simplicity.
The government is putting in place a system whereby the
All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE)-approved
institutions will be given a period of 2-3 years to submit
progress reports. Technical institutes, at present, submit
annual progress and status reports which they find very
tedious.
“Many institutes do not make drastic changes on
the campuses every year. So there’s no point asking
them to furnish the same reports every year compiling
which is a Herculean task,” reasons an official
from the ministry of Human Resources Development (MHRD)
who is looking at revamp of AICTE.
This is just one of the many steps the government is introducing
to help ACITE clean up its act even as it has set up a
task force to study the proposal for a new body —
the National Commission for Higher Education and Research
(NCHER) to supercede regulatory bodies like the AICTE
and University Grants Commission (UGC). These measures
are aimed at revamping and making AICTE more transparent.
MHRD officials, on condition of anonymity, say there will
be more policy changes related to AICTE. Some changes
might necessitate modification in the AICTE Act also.
“We are trying to put everything on the fast track.
But till the NCHER takes shape, we will have to deal with
AICTE’s troubled past. Improving transparency will
be a continuous feature now,” says a top MHRD official.
As part of this process, MHRD on January 7 launched the
website of the AICTE, wherein institutes would be required
to introduce an online self disclosure regime, greatly
reducing any human interface in the approvals process.
Processing of all applications for approvals have been
made online from January 10. No inspection of existing
institutions will take place unless there are complaints
against them. New technical institutions, too, will be
inspected only once — that is when they apply for
recognition.
Only MBA and MCA courses are to be considered for approval
through the distance mode education they have put in place
an entire process of revamping the technical education
regulator. There are around 2,872 existing institutions
with intake capacity of 10,71,896 seats. Moreover, the
new system will have several rounds of checks, with the
institutions applying for approvals having to file 42
documents. After they have filed the first 20, they would
be allowed to go to the next stage of another 20, which
would get them a permanent unique identity (UID) number.
Students and faculty members, too, would get UID numbers
through the portal.
Teachers will mark their attendance through a biometric
system. A student’s ID number will help the ministry
keep track that institutes do not admit more than their
intake capacity. “New systems are being devised
so as to reduce human interface and thereby reduce instances
of bribery. This is a welcome change by the institutes,”
said an official from one of the B-schools which has to
furnish reports every year to AICTE.
AICTE is an advisory and statutory body established for
proper planning and coordinated development of technical
education system throughout the country. However, gross
irregularities in its processes surfaced in August, with
the arrest of its member secretary, along with a middleman,
while accepting a bribe of Rs 5 lakh for granting approval
to an engineering college in New Delhi.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) also filed cases
against five officials, including the chairman and secretary
of a Hyderabad-based engineering college. The system,
as it existed, enabled middlemen to lobby for college
managements whose approvals were rejected by the expert
committee appointed by AICTE after inspection. With the
help of middlemen, several “rejected” colleges
managed to obtain approval by the misuse of power by some
officials.
“The authorities which existed have messed up the
higher education system. They accepted bribe to the tune
of Rs 6-10 crore to upgrade institutes to deemed universities.
Nothing can be more appalling,” said a planning
commission member. Technical education institutions win
deemed university status on the basis of the AICTE’s
recommendation, which needs to be accepted by the UGC.
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