This year’s union budget has been presented in the backdrop of intensified economic crisis due to the disastrous demonetization, which was nothing but a ploy increase the liquidity in the banks that were on the brink of collapse due to the massively piled NPAs by the big businesses. However, finance minister in his budget has refused to even acknowledge the people’s woes caused by demonetization. Government claims that demonetization will have only short term impact and in the long run it will lead to ‘big, cleaner and real’ GDP. There is no economic rationale behind this assertion, at a time when demonetization has badly affected industrial output, agriculture and informal sector. In essence this year’s budget is an exercise in self deception.

 

The present situation required a massive increase in the budgetary allocations in social sector spending, so as to increase the domestic demand. However, the budget continues to be marred by neoliberal conservatism, with focus entirely on somehow reducing the fiscal deficit. While the fiscal deficit for the financial year 2016-17 was 3.2% of GDP, in the same year the tax forgone was a massive 3.18 lakh crore that is equal to 2.1% of the GDP. The social sector spending including that on education can be increased by reducing the concessions to the corporates and big businesses. The fact that government hasn’t done so is only a pointer of its priorities.

 

The budgetary outlay for SCs and STs are 2.4% and 1.2% of the total outlay respectively, both of which are far less than their share in population. Similarly the gender budget spending is merely 5.3% of the outlay, which again is far less than the prescribed 30%.

 

One more important aspect of this year’s budget has been the decision to do away with the classification of plan and non-plan expenditure. This is in line with the government’s decision to dismantle the Planning Commission and replacing the Five-Year Plan mechanism by a medium to long-term planning system under the NITI Aayog. Apart from a more aggressive push towards market reforms, this move also means that this year’s budgetary allocations can’t be compared with the last year’s allocations.

 

When it comes to education, finance minister’s budget speech is marred by absolute lack of attention and concern. No commitments have been made in increasing the budgetary outlays in any of the sectors. Instead we merely see some promises.

 

Finance minister talks about reforming UGC and then providing financial autonomy to the college and universities based on the ranking as per the mandatory accreditation. This is in tune with the neoliberal push that we have been witnessing since the period of congress-led UPA-1. It will only lead to increasing the already existing wide gap in the various sectors of education.

 

There is a talk of 100 international skills Centre with courses in foreign languages, Rs 4000 crore for skill acquisition and knowledge awareness and priority on science education. This too is in tune with the government’s empty rhetoric of ‘skill education’, while the actual trajectory of the educational policy is towards deskilling the youth.

 

We can clearly see increasing thrust of centralization with the proposal of a separate testing agency to take all entrance exams in the country; while the existing bodies such CBSE, AICTE etc will be asked to focus on academics only.

 

The CEC of SFI sees the union budget an exercise in self deception, which refuses to understand the ground reality of the masses. The same attitude can be witnessed in the budgetary allocations and promises made in the education sector. While the education sector today requires massive expansion to reap the benefits of the demographic dividend, the present approach of this government will only lead to worsening of the quality in all spheres of education. CEC calls upon all its units to remain vigilant on the concrete manifestations of this budget in the campuses and accordingly make necessary interventions.

                             Released by

VP Sanu (President)                   Vikram Singh (General Secretary)

 

University Grants Commission (UGC) came with a new notification on the MPhil/PhD admission which was published in the gazette on 5th May, 2016. The disastrous impact of this notification on the social justice, autonomy and inclusive nature of the universities is in front of all of us. Jawaharlal Nehru University and Delhi University have recently authoritatively pushed this notification, overriding the impact that it will have on the students from the deprived sections. Similarly, we also have the experience of Kerala University, where the VC (appointed by the UDF government) implemented this notification authoritatively and this led to drastic reduction in the seats.

This UGC notification far from being a “guideline” is in effect a “straightjacket” with rigid examination criteria, admission rules and the criteria for the eligibility of research supervision.

The Notification says clearly that higher educational institution “shall admit candidates by a two stage process through: An Entrance Test shall be qualifying with qualifying marks as 50%. The syllabus of the Entrance Test shall consist of 50% of research methodology and 50% shall be subject specific. An interview/viva-voce to be organized by the institution when the candidates are required to discuss their research interest/area through a presentation before a duly constituted Department Research Committee. The interview/viva voce shall also consider the following aspects, viz. whether: the candidate possesses the competence for the proposed research; the research work can be suitably undertaken at the Institution/College; the proposed area of research can contribute to new/additional knowledge.”

At a time when the Abdul Nafey committee constituted by the JNU administration has itself come to a conclusion (based on the analysis of the admission related data) that discrimination based on caste and ‘social group’ is indeed a reality. Hence, it recommended that the viva marks be reduced from ‘30% to 15%’ to mitigate this discrimination. There are similar empirical data on the caste based discrimination in other universities as well. Now, we are being pushed towards 100% viva.

The fact that the “entrance test” will have uniform qualifying marks of 50% across the categories, will in effect mean that in many of the universities there would be a real possibility of ‘no student from the reserved category” found suitable for the interview. Hence, this model will act as a ploy to restrict the implementation of the constitutionally guaranteed reservation policy.

The template based approach in deciding the question papers to the interview content will erode the academic autonomy of the universities.

Further, the notification also lays down strict rules regarding the eligibility of “research supervision”. It says: “A Research Supervisor/Co-supervisor who is a Professor, at any given point of time, cannot guide more than three (3)M.Phil. and Eight (8) Ph.D. scholars. An Associate Professor as Research Supervisor can guide up to a maximum of two (2) M.Phil. and six (6) Ph.D. scholars and an Assistant Professor as Research Supervisor can guide up to a maximum of one (1) M.Phil. and four (4) Ph.D. scholars.”

This basically means that there are will be a drastic reduction in the available number of MPhil and PhD seats in all our public universities.

The CEC of SFI strongly denounces this disastrous gazette notification and demands that it be taken back immediately. We do understand that there is a need for review of the prevailing admission norms in our universities and research institutions. However, any change must lead towards greater representation of the students from the deprived communities and not the contrary. At the same time, an overarching mechanism which erodes the autonomy of universities can’t be accepted at all.

This assault is part and parcel of the RSS-BJP’s agenda of attack on social justice and public universities. SFI calls upon all its university units to build robust movement against this attack.

Released by

VP Sanu (President)

Vikram Singh (General Secretary)

The shocking incident of the death of Jishnu, a first year Engineering student in a private college run by the Nehru Group of Institutions at Thrissur, Kerala is an another brutal example of the undemocratic character of the self financing institutions in our country. Jishnu committed suicide on 6th January 2017 following the mental and physical torture that he underwent at the hand of some teachers and the management after he was accused, without any evidence, of malpractice in the examination hall. The latest report exposed the fact that no report of malpractice by Jishnu has been sent to the examination controller. It has become clear that the accusations against him was completely manipulated by the teacher. The unfortunate death of Jishnu also reveals the inhuman attitude of the profiteering private educational institutions towards the students. The self financing colleges are transforming into jails where students are imprisoned with no rights or voice. Feudal atmosphere is set up in almost all such campuses and students are treated as slaves under the authoritarian managements. This is yet another example of the vulnerable position of students in a privatised education sector which promotes depoliticisation and alienation of the student community. Students are denied even their constitutional rights of association and freedom of speech. Neither any democratic forums nor elected students unions are allowed in these institutions. Jishnu's death is not a suicide. It is an institutional murder. This hunt on students by the private managements cannot be tolerated for any democratic and progressive society.

The Central Executive Committee of SFI demands the Kerala Government to speed up the enquiry to punish the culprits in this particular case and ensure justice to Jishnu. We also recognize that this is not an isolated incident. A legislation must be enacted by the parliament to ensure the campus democracy and elected student unions in all educational institutions in the country. No self financing managements must be granted this scoundrel free run. SFI appeals all democratic and progressive sections to join in the ongoing movement for justice for Jishnu.

 

           VP Sanu (President)                                                                                                        Vikram Singh (General Secretary)

Rohith was institutionally murdered one year ago by the forces of Hindutva. Today we are facing renewed attacks by RSS unabated, with the most oppressed section bearing the brunt of such attacks.

Let us resolve:

We will not let universities be run like RSS Shakhas!

No more Eklavyas, No more Rohiths!