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The recent collapse of the auditorium roof at Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College, Dwarka, on August 29, 2023, has raised several burning questions pertaining to the ignorance of college administrations and poor infrastructure management at DU colleges.

On Tuesday, the newly-built auditorium at Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College in Dwarka witnessed a chunk of its ceiling collapsing, barely a few months after a similar infrastructure catastrophe occurred at Kamala Nehru College. However, sources have reported that no injuries were sustained since nobody was present in the auditorium at the time of the accident.

A part of the roof, the false-ceiling of the auditorium—all bricks and plaster—collapsed. The auditorium was closed after that, causing our annual orientation programme for freshers, Deekshaarambh which was to be conducted between 31st August and 2nd September to be postponed until further notice. The accident occurred exactly a day after an event related to the G-20 was conducted in the auditorium.

– Student at Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College

The mishap has raised several eyebrows because of the award-winning infrastructure that the college houses. The college, which was shifted to a new campus in Dwarka in 2016 because of worsening infrastructure at its old campus in Karampura, has received the Vishwakarma Award 2017 for its state-of-the-art building. All the classrooms, lecture theatres, library, computer centre, cafeteria, and most of the laboratories are fully air-conditioned. The campus has rainwater harvesting, solar power generation, and a sewage treatment plant with a water recycling facility.

Despite such top-notch facilities, most students point out that the major reason behind the roof accident could be ‘poor maintenance’ by the college administration over the years since the college shifted to the new campus in Dwarka in 2016. Asking about the condition of the general infrastructure of the college, students mention that it is common for lifts to malfunction, the stairs are in bad condition, and the new campus has fallen into rust with time.

The auditorium has been closed by the college administration, with no updates on when it will be reopened as of now. Related to the ignorance of the administration, another student mentioned,

The general infrastructure of the college was good initially, but its buildings are snapping and need maintenance. But the administration is not taking swift action.

Infrastructure woes have troubled DU colleges for years. But frequent, life-threatening mishaps need to be treated seriously. Voices should be raised against poor infrastructure, low college funds, and the malfunctioning of the administration department. It is, after all, a question of students’ and faculty’s safety. Why are college funds not diverted to maintain college infrastructure? Why does the administration hardly ever step up during such deadly accidents? Are infrastructure mishaps going to plague DU forever? Where does this end?

Read Also: The Sky is Falling – State of Infrastructure at Kamala Nehru College

Featured Image Credits: Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College Website

Priyanka Mukherjee
[email protected]

Read on to find out the plights of students from a student of Delhi University (DU). This piece gives an insight into how different colleges withing our University are dealing with the pandemic. 

In these intense or rather stressful times of COVID-19 when the students are sceptical about their college and future and the college should take some actions to calm the students down. Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College (DDUC) of Delhi University is paying no heed to any of these issues and moreover still using their tactful ways to bother and impose irrelevant obligations on them.

The hostel administration of Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College is forcing the students to pay their quarter fees while no one is residing in the hostel. In these stressful times of lockdown when no one is allowed to go out and the financial conditions are not in good shape, the administration is forcing the residents to pay the quarter fee. The fee for the facilities (water and electricity) no one is consuming.

Moreover, the administration has denied answering any queries of the students or parents regarding this matter saying “no clarification would be issued in this matter. It is a compulsory fee and needs to be paid”. If not paid there is an imposition of INR 50 per day as a penalty. And this amount would not be refunded to the students. The very fact that this all is happening even after the orders of the government for asking for any further fee is saddening. This just another way of extracting money for these capitalist institutions. This sense of torture from the hostel authorities is now affecting us personally, with following a different set of rules for girls and boys’ hostels for handling situations.

This is just not it; the students of this college are suffering from the start of this academic session and this is just a chain of events that has led us to this point. The residents of the hostel have been facing such problems from the start of this academic session. After not having had got any answer from the authorities the residents resorted to the action of putting up a strike for the basic needs against the administration. But this was dismissed by the principal by the threat of suspension.

The union council elections were also suspended by the administration which is the basic entity for getting our voice to the ears of the authorities. The cancelling of union defeats the purpose of decent and our say of asking any questions. There is no transparency in any sort of matter.

All these add up to a totalitarian rule of the principal and other authorities which is suppressing the students and hostel residents, leading to no other option left to get our voice reached to the people. These links are for the support of the prior strike held against the authorities.

Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College, currently based in Karampura, is shifting to a new campus in Sector 3, Dwarka in mid – June before the new academic session begins.

The college, which started in 1989, has been using a school building for 25 years. It was in 2013 that the foundation stone of the new Dwarka Campus was unveiled by Sheila Dixit. The new campus reportedly has five times the space of their current campus.

The new campus of DDUC is multi-storeyed. It has an auditorium with a  seating capacity of about 400 people, along with two seminar rooms, 12 lecture theatres and 26 lecture rooms for 2500 of its currently enrolled students. In addition, it has better infrastructure facilities for sports which has a provision for indoor squash, table tennis, archery and a gymnasium among other facilities. It has also been claimed to be eco-friendly, with rain water harvesting system and ongoing work on solar power generation system. The old school building will be given to Ambedkar University, Delhi.

The President of DDUC students Union, Garvit Choudhary, welcomed the change. However, he also expressed his concerns and said, “When there is  change, it is always accompanied by mixed responses. While most are looking forward to the new campus, some are not. For instance, it would be difficult for some students travelling from Noida and North campus to travel to Dwarka. Nevertheless the new campus has mostly been welcomed by one and all”

 Featured image credits: du.ac.in

With inputs from Hindustan Times

Tooba Towfiq

[email protected]

Fin-S, the Finance Club of DDUC, led by Ankit Bhaskar, Sahil Matta and Vaibhav Goel, successfully organized their Annual Finance Fest, Finanza 2016. A two-day finance fest, Finanza saw a participation from students of different colleges and gave them a chance to showcase their skills and financial acumen as well as have some fun. The event was an attempt to postulate distinct spheres of the financial globe. In its third year, it comprised of 4 events held on 11th and 12th March,2016. Presenting a mock of stock market in “Capitalist Bulls”, injecting corporate essence to the game of monopoly in “Corporate Monopoly”, launching IPOs of NPAs in “Investocrats”, and deriving financial moves through discussions in “All India Business Conclave” with discussions majorly focused around the agenda – Ease of Doing Business in India, Finanza 2016 came with a mock of different financial practices to college students. The event offered an opportunity to the students to get acquainted with the intricacies of the Financial world and various colleges across DU, IP and others including Symbiosis, Pune etc. marked their presence on both the days and battled it out on the elevated platform provided by DDUC. It was their chance to excel in the field of Finance. Breaking the monotony and unfolding new sides, Investocrats brought a completely different arena of Stock Market and required students to use their analytical skills and knowledge to give life to dead and depressed companies, Capitalist Bulls, a mock stock competition gave students real – time stocks and fictitious token amount to trade and become the real investors the All India Business Conclave presented students with an opportunity to represent global leaders and debate on issues that confront India. ]]>

The annual cultural festival of Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College (DDUC), Kalrav took place on the 27th and 28th of March after getting postponed frequently. The festival was scheduled to take place in February but got cancelled due to internal issues.

The event was exclusively for the students of DDUC. The college held its Annual Prize Distribution Ceremony for the year 2013-14 on the same day. Mr. S.P. Dixit, IAS Officer and Mr. Ravi Chaturvedi, an eminent cricket commentator were the chief guests for the event.

An exhibition of photographs clicked by the members of the DDUC photography society was put up. A very distinct event, Mera Gaon, Mera Ghar, Mera Bachpan was also held. Different departments of the college showcased memories and artifacts from their childhood. This event was especially designed for outstation students to portray the traditions and culture of their home state. The fest also saw a Grafitti contest whose theme was “The Blissful Life”. Students of B.Com (Hons) won the top spot. This was followed by a concert- Satvik Heights by Ankit Batra , an internationally acclaimed singer, an enthralling performance by the Delhi Drummers and also by the band, Solfege.
The second day began with Satvik chants recited by the Music society. Inter department contest was held for traditional games like pithoo, stapoo, rassi kood and lattoo; most of which was won by the Department of Zoology.

Exult-the dance society and Rhythm-the music society mesmerized the crowd with their performances. Yavanika- the theatre society’s performance was appreciated by all. “Their spirit was superb”, said Aashima Sharma, a volunteer at Kalrav. This was followed by the performance from Rock Veda, a fusion band that has also featured on MTV’s Coke Studio. The fest came to an end with the lighting of the sky lanterns by the college students.