Maharashtra forms panel to inspect self-financing universities

Explaining the need for such a committee, a senior official from Maharashtra’s higher and technical education department said, “With newer policies encouraging cluster universities by combining colleges run by single managements, more self-financed universities are likely to add to this number. This is why there is a need to monitor their functioning.”

The six-member committee — headed by professor Dr. G D Yadav, former director of the Institute of Chemical Technology (ICT) — has been tasked with submitting a report in two months. The Government Resolution (GR) issued earlier this week in this regard by the state’s higher and technical education department also details a long task-list for the committee.

Apart from verifying the infrastructural facilities in these universities — such as buildings, laboratories, libraries other structures, including facilities for persons with disabilities — the committee is also expected to collate details on manpower at work, with a focus on how many of them are contractually appointed in teaching and non-teaching posts. Other details to be scrutinised are the process of appointing vice chancellors, the number of research students and the field work varsities are engaged in, the universities’ financial books and their compliance with anti-ragging regulations.