‘Thrive for excellence’: NAAC accreditation now in binary terms, 2 terms for institutions

Though NAAC has not scrapped the grading system, it, however, desires to expedite the binary accreditation as per NEP-2020. A detailed plan will be prepared for future reforms in consultation with stakeholders, and after taking advice from the UGC and the Ministry.

Patwardhan was in Mumbai on Friday to attend a day-long state level conference titled ‘Accreditation: The Way Ahead’ at the Mumbai University’s Kalina campus.

“We will also have various parameters for the NAAC accreditation for colleges or universities offering a different nature of the courses. Individual programmes run by a college or an individual department of any university will also have the opportunity to apply for the NAAC accreditation,” Patwardhan said.

The NAAC organised the conference in association with the Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA) for principals and management representatives of non-accredited colleges across Maharashtra, in a bid to create awareness of the process of accreditation.

Chandrakant Patil, Maharashtra Higher and Technical Education Minister, inaugurated the exhibition curated by the Mumbai University to showcase different initiatives taken by colleges and universities with good NAAC ratings across the state.

Patil said, “We have 4,494 colleges and 65 universities, out of which, 1,854 are NAAC accredited. Out of 1,177 aided institutions, 1,096 are NAAC accredited, and out of 2,141 non-aided educational institutions, 1,909 have not completed their accreditation process. This is a concern for us as we have been encouraging the accreditation process among all the colleges and universities for a better quality of higher education.”