Members of DU's Academic Council, Teachers' Body Write to VC, Condemn Atishi's Letter to Centre

Members of the Delhi University’s Academic Council and a teachers’ body on Tuesday submitted a memorandum to Vice Chancellor Yogesh Singh calling for an urgent meeting to discuss “irregularities” in 12 colleges highlighted by Delhi Education Minister Atishi in a recent letter to the Centre. Condemning Atishi’s letter, the Indian National Teachers Congress (INTEC) said that a significant policy matter pertaining to these 12 colleges was presented before Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan without consulting the stakeholders.

Atishi wrote the letter to Pradhan on Friday flagging “irregularities and procedural lapses involving hundreds of crores of rupees from the public exchequer” in 12 Delhi University colleges that are funded by the city government. She said since these colleges are “directly affiliated with DU”, they’re not answerable to the Delhi government for the judicious utilisation of funds. She suggested that the colleges can either be merged and brought under the Delhi government or the Centre may disaffiliate them and take their full control and in that case, the Delhi government will stop allocating funds to them.

The memorandum said, “The letter erroneously categorises these 12 colleges as ’affiliated’ when in fact, they are ’constituent’ colleges of the University of Delhi and are inseparable from the university.” “The Delhi government’s intent to transform these colleges into Autonomous Degree Granting Colleges under clause 10.3 of the New Education Policy (NEP) clearly signals a privatisation agenda, rendering education unaffordable for economically weaker sections,” it said. The memorandum further said a special Executive Meeting should be convened urgently by the Delhi University to deliberate on this issue and arrive at a decisive resolution.

In a statement, INTEC “unequivocally” condemned Atishi’s letter concerning the 12 colleges that receive 100 per cent funding from the Delhi government. It also condemned the city government’s proposal to disaffiliate these colleges from Delhi University and designate them to Ambedkar University or Delhi Skills and Entrepreneurship University, saying that not only do these universities have exorbitant fee structures, they also do not offer science stream courses.

The teachers’ body alleged that insufficient allocation of grants to these colleges has plunged them into a severe financial crisis, and salaries of teachers and non-teaching staff are often delayed for several months. Additionally, there are pending arrears amounting to crores of rupees for teachers who have been promoted in the last one and a half years, it claimed.