DUTA Press Release, 22 February 2018

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Hundreds of teachers participated in the Aakrosh Jalsa called by the DUTA today at the Vice Chancellor’s Office. It is unfortunate that in a premier University, teachers have been waiting for appointments, promotions and pension without any resolution in sight. While the University and most colleges have fared amongst the best in the country in the NAAC rating and the NIRF ranking and each admission sees cut-offs soaring high, the long pending issues of appointments and promotions of teachers who have worked hard in building institutions have been completely disregarded. While permanent appointments are being denied to a large section of young colleagues and an equally large section of permanent teachers are languishing without a single promotion since 2008 or even before. No visible steps are being taken by the current administration to find a resolution to the issue of pensions for retired teachers who have spent their entire lives serving the university. No progress in release of pension has been made even in those cases that are not subjudice, namely category 3 as well as the ‘options’ category who are in GPF with pension for the last twenty years. The 28 colleges funded/aided by Delhi Government are without full Governing Bodies for over a year now. This has crippled governance in these colleges and has resulted in delay in the selection process of Principals and teachers.

Speaker after speaker underlined the urgency of filling up of vacant posts on permanent basis. Despite the High Court order of December 2017 which asked the University to fill vacant posts in a time bound manner, the University has failed to take steps required to even start the process. Over two thousand posts, predominately in colleges, were advertised in the summer of 2017. While appointments have been held for a few University Departments, till date only one college has held selection process, that too for only one discipline. The delay has created an unprecedented situation in the University and unrest amongst teachers. This delay reveals a callous approach towards the future of a large numbers of teachers who have been working on temporary and ad-hoc basis against these positions for long years. This also has negative consequences for the teaching learning process.

The DUTA demands that the University seeks progress report from colleges on recruitment and fixes responsibilities for delays. The University Administration must also release the schedules for interviews and announce it on the website without any further delay. The DUTA demands for a fair and transparent process so that all long serving temporary and ad-hoc teachers can be regularised/ absorbed. The DUTA reiterates its demand that the UGC Regulations requiring selection of teachers on the basis of marks in the ratio of 50:30:20 under various categories to be used to introduce greater transparency in the appointment process. The award-list and the criteria of awarding marks under various categories (50:30:20) should form an integral part of the minutes of the Selection Committees. These should be made public and shared in the Executive Council in the case of recruitments in Departments and with the Governing Bodies in case of the colleges.

The DUTA warns the DU administration against any further delay in resolution of the demands.