Attendance app cost DU college Rs 60 lakh: RTI

“We are not even sure what the ERP is because it was installed without any discussion with the stakeholders. It is supposed to be for more than attendance — such as forming timetables, etc — but none of that is happening,” Misra said. “It is only functional at the library; accounts and administration departments are not using it. This is a waste of public money.”

But calling opposition to the software “political” in nature, college Principal Savithri Singh said, “I don’t remember the cost but it has happened over three years. The system does much more than (record) attendance…. It’s not an exorbitant amount considering the number of students we have and the annual cost.”

“Initially, we utilised some money from the UGC funds but the college is paying the rest. We have among the lowest fee structure among DU colleges, so it’s not like we are fleecing students,” she said.

According to the RTI reply, Rs 9,61,400 was spent on the ERP in 2014-15; Rs 14,42,100 in 2015-2016; a similar amount in 2016-17; and Rs 10,08,100 till September this year. The total figure also includes a one-time deployment fee of Rs 4,26,968, and Rs 6,44,000 in salary to the transformation manager.

“The transformation manager is not even an employee of the college but he is being paid from the college fund since 2015. This system does not work – they had tried using it during the student council election but it failed. In the end they had to use paper voting,” another ANDC teacher said.

Principal Singh said, “By implementing this system, we want to move everything online. We have got approval from the Governing Body. This was also one of the reasons we got a higher NAAC grade (over) St Stephen’s.”