Maharashtra government appoints committee to frame guidelines for improving new colleges and courses

In order to bring up new colleges, courses, additional divisions and satellite centres, an eight-member committee has been appointed by the state government to frame clear and detailed guidelines and norms for the same. The new norms which this panel will form will be followed by the universities and department of higher and technical Education for approving new colleges and courses.

As per an Indian Express report, Dr RS Mali, former Vice Chancellor of North Maharashtra University in Jangan will head the committee. It will study the old norms in detail before framing new guidelines.

It is expected to submit the draft to the state government by February 25.

The norms of sanctioning new colleges, courses, curriculums and additional divisions have been specified under section 81, 82 and 83 of Maharashtra Universities Act 1994. The same has been specified in the amended Maharashtra Public Universities Act 2016.

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Need for an expert panel:

“Even though norms and guidelines about sanctioning new colleges existed in the old act as well as the new one, the state government wanted an expert panel to study these guidelines and make them stringent to raise the quality of education across the state. Approving new colleges will not be a simple affair anymore,” said principal of a well known college in Mumbai and one of the members of the committee.

Approval of new colleges has been hanging fire for quite a long time. Experts have often alleged that approval of colleges without proper scrutiny has been increasing the burden on universities.

source”cnbc”