DUTA PRESS Release, 31 May 2014: University Administration Cracks Down on Protests Against Misgovernance in SOL

DUTA PRESS Release:  31 May 2014

University Administration Cracks Down on Protests Against Misgovernance in SOL

The University has clearly tied itself up in knots by first, reportedly, suspending five non-teaching employees from the SOL on grounds of leaking “confidential” information pertaining to HRD Minister Smriti Irani’s Admission Ticket, and then backtracking and denying the suspensions. The DUTA welcomes the prompt appeal made by Smt. Smriti Irani to revoke suspension. The information of these suspensions has caused undue harassment of the non-teaching staff and the DU administration needs to fix responsibility for this action.

The matter of information regarding Admission Tickets does not fall in the category of Confidential Items.The DUTA strongly condemns any move of DU administration to suspend non-teaching staff on this account. In case there have been suspensions, it demands that suspensions be revoked immediately.  More importantly, the University has not followed any accepted procedure leading up to such a drastic decision. No show-cause was issued to any of these individuals; neither was any inquiry conducted to establish their responsibility. Such a knee-jerk reaction is characteristic of the authoritarian and paranoid functioning of the University Administration in the current VC’s tenure.

Students, teachers and karamcharis of SOL have been deeply perturbed by the University’s misgovernance of SOL and its expressed plan to discontinue the regular degree programmes and replace them with diploma and certificate courses in Vocational streams. That would change the fundamental character of the SOL, while also denying lakhs of students the opportunity to earn their degrees through distance learning. Hence, students and teachers have gathered under the banner of the DUTA to vehemently protest such a move.

In order to diffuse the controversy over misgovernance in the SOL , it has resorted to the petty tactic of diverting public attention towards the Admission Ticket fiasco. It has also served, through Executive Director SOL Prof. Pokhriyal,  a prompt show-cause notice to the SOL Staff Association President, Dr. N. K. Aggarwal (Dept. of Commerce) for organizing a protest dharna in its premises on 29^th May, and allegedly spreading “false information” about the university’s decision to scrap degree programmes in SOL. However, the DU and SOL authorities have failed to explain why they did not issue a clarification contradicting the news report about the proposed scrapping of degree courses, on the basis of which the students, teachers and karamcharis of SOL had organized a protest dharna on the 29^th. (The copy of the show-cause notice will be emailed separately.)

The DUTA slams this attempt to stifle dissent and protest against its misgovernance in SOL. The DUTA stands in solidarity with Dr. N. K. Aggarwal and demands that the University Administration  withdraw this baseless show-cause notice immediately.

The DUTA also urges the University Administration to cease the several hostile attacks against dissenting teachers all over the University  and desist from intimidating the teaching community. The atmosphere of intimidation it has created in the University is proving to be inimical to any possibility of open and honest dialogue within the institution.

Nandita Narain

President, DUTA

Harish Khanna

Secretary, DUTA

Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA)