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DUTA Strikes and Burns Effigy of VC

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The teachers, students and karamcharis have not yet given up against the alleged “Unprecedented assault on democratic rights” by the DU’s VC. Wednesday, 31st October 2012, DUTA (Delhi University Teachers Union), backed up by DUSU (Delhi University Students Union) and DUCKU (Delhi University College Karamchari Union) burned the effigy of the Vice- chancellor outside his office at around 3:30 pm.  The DUTA has been on a relay hunger strike since the 10th of October demanding from the vice chancellor answers to their various grievances concerning arbitrary imposition of “academic reforms”, withdrawal of the right to revaluation, violation of anonymity of exams, delay in declaring exam results so on and so forth.

Around hundreds of students, teachers and non-teaching staff gathered to witness and participate in the protest. The administration tried its best to dissolve the crowd and curb the burning process by instructing the university’s security personnel to steal away the effigy, but the DUTA continued anyway. The security breached the law in front of the ineffective and mute police force by trying to take away the head and other parts of the effigy. The crowd arranged another effigy and burned newspaper in the meantime.

“It was a complete chaos, with officials trying to crush the protest and crowd not budging from the venue. It is quite shocking that the police were just standing there, doing absolutely nothing!” said Vidushi a student. “We have no idea what is going on in the university, even the teachers are at loss. There are new academic changes with every passing day!” adds another.

Teachers said that the authorities are now spreading rumors that the DUSU and DUCKU have withdrawn their support from the movement. “This is shameful. This is for the first time that DUSU, DUCKU and DUTA have come together. We have letters from these unions citing their support,” said a DUTA member.

 

Aishwarya Chaurasia
[email protected]

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Campus Central

Caught in a cobweb: DUTA strikes

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Emerging from what has transformed into a completely bitter symphony, the on-going tangles of discontentment have brewed into a series of brawls between the DUTA members and the Vice Chancellor of Delhi University. The coercive governance by the authorities and the non-receptiveness of any dialogue with the teachers pertaining to the up surging issues, followed by insinuating the teacher’s association as ‘illegal’ has sprung up a steamy situation for every stakeholder of this renowned university.

On Wednesday the hunger strike by DUTA members marked the tenth day of protest, channelizing a way for the emergence of yet another agenda for Thursday, 18th October.  On the aforementioned date the members of DUTA marched barefoot around the campus of the university to ascertain the Right to Education to the economically weaker sections of the society, in the arrears of massive privatization and commercialization. The motive of the protest was also a well sunken thought to stir a voice of justice for the girl who was molested during the DUSU elections earlier. An air of pitiful disgrace was expressed with respect to banning democratic protests in the campus post the incident. The strike seems to evolve due to a multitude of driving factors arising due to the haphazard manner in which the university is dealing with semesterization. In the ambit of unilateral decision making, the authorities have completely shunned out on any influential contribution by the teachers who are intricate brunt bearers and facilitators of the semester system. The threat of pay cuts in case of any demonstrations has also leapt as a severe bone of contention. There are several questions being posed on the claimed acceleration of the standard of the university which has duly failed in providing and enabling the mere necessities of a conducive environment for accessing education.

The acceptance and enhancement of semester system as another rung in the towering ladder of a ‘glistening’ education in this country continues to be a contentious argument, one year after its implementation. Students have queued up their dismal grievances to unflattering redressal, corresponding to which they extended their support and accompanied the teachers through the days of the strike. In the domain of responsible demonstrations, the teachers have ensured regular classes and have prudently conducted these strikes for a cause. Deliberation and enactment can only condense the appalling situation of the largest democracy’s top ranked university, where the essence of an ironic situation seems to persist.

 

Image source: The Hindu 

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Campus Central

DUTA on Indefinite Relay Hunger Strike

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After making umpteen appeals to the VC, the Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA) has decided to up the ante. The association has been sitting on an indefinite relay hunger strike from 10th of October against the way decisions were being made in the varsity.

Twenty-three teachers from Ramjas College, Daulat Ram College, Delhi College of Arts and Commerce and Deen Dyal Upadhyay College and eminent DUTA executive members – DUTA secretary S. D. Siddiqui, former DUTA president Aditya Narayan Misra and Academic Council members A.K. Bhagi and M.R. Chikkara were the prime participants on first day of the strike.

“Teachers are increasingly being thrown out of decision making and the VC has shown utter disregard to the teachers’ democratic body,” said DUTA Executive member Abha Dev Habib.

DUTA is against Vice Chancellor for his contemptuous ignore of the teacher’s association and destroying the entire academic fabric by announcing new courses and academic programmes through media and running the University as his personal fiefdom.

“VC has browbeaten the entire university fraternity to accept his fanciful decisions. The drastic changes in examination and evaluation of answer-scripts, yet again announced to the media without any discussion in the Academic Council, may justifiably seem insane to the public at large but they also serve to aptly illustrate his egoism and the utterly deluded and directionless nature of his reforms,’ said one of the DUTA members.

In spite of the strike classes were not called off and teacher’s taught by taking leave for some time to take their classes.  Last time VC ordered principals of colleges to deduct salaries of those teachers who participated in the strike on 28 August.

DUTA is also planning a candle-light vigil on Friday night to further their cause. The candle-light vigil is for the 4,000 teachers who have been condemned to continue teaching in ad-hoc capacity despite being eligible.

Sakshi Gupta
[email protected]

Image source: The Hindu 

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Campus Central

DUTA takes a dig at Vice Chancellor while meeting the President

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A deputation comprising of all the Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA) office bearers met the President of India, Hon’ble Shri Pranab Mukherjee, on September 21 to inform him of the widespread administrative vacuum and sedition of the varsity’s autonomy affected by the dysfunctional and autocratic Vice Chancellor of the University from the time he took over in November 2010.

In it’s press release for the same, DUTA has stated that the lapses on the VC’s part includes ‘series of violations of the University Act, its Statutes and Ordinances, the brazen misuse of Emergency Powers to bring in courses and start new Centers like the Cluster Innovation Center, the manner in which he has forced the AC to pass plagiarized courses under the B. Tech in Innovation programme, as well as his culpability and lack of accountability in the widely reported ‘Marks Scam’ in the first semester results’. This all, they alleged, have led to the embarrasment and dishonor of the Unversity.

Moreover, the delegation reportedly acquainted the President about the apparent impunity with which the ‘Vice Chancellor has attempted to stonewall any possibility of dialogue with the democratic organs of the University’. They especially drew attention to the fact that despite DUTA constantly raising the issues of four thousand teaching vacancies in the University, the constitutional need to immediately implement the UGC’s Reservation Policy of 2006 and start the process of long-due promotions at the earliest, Dinesh Singh responded with hostility and never made an endeavour to meet the DUTA. They also alleged him of ‘making slanderous remarks against DUTA and threatening teachers against participating in the activities of their Association’.

Apparently, the members also claimed that Singh also tried using ‘cheap and cowardly tactic’ in the sense that he tried putting pressure on the Principals of SRCC and Ramjas College in order to deny their organization a space to conduct its annual general body meeting on September 22. However, according to the them, the tactic was finally withdrawn as he realized that the President had agreed to meet the DUTA.

Urging the President to intervene, the delegation expressed its concern that ‘if the VC is allowed to carry on functioning in the present manner, he will push the University towards a catastrophe’. Reportedly, the President has promised that he will ensure the answerability of the VC, and the restoration of administrative delivery and the University’s prestige to the satisfaction of the teachers.

 

Vatsal Verma
[email protected] 

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Campus Central

Biometric Attendence for Teachers Quite a Possibility

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Last month, the court had issued a notice to DU authorities after a PIL was filed by the Indian Council of Legal Aid and Advice, seeking to introduce a biometric system to register the attendance of lecturers and other teaching staff of the university. The PIL said that the attendance system should be introduced to ensure that a teacher “adheres to the teaching hours and days prescribed by the UGC and the university rules”. As per the UGC norms, the workload of teachers should not be less than 40 hours a week for 180 teaching days, apart from being available for at least five hours daily in the college. The working hours actually put in by a lecturer in Delhi University daily are just about three and half hours per day currently.

The affidavit filed by the registrar said: “The University of Delhi is committed to adopt and implement measures which are favourable and beneficial to the university system as a whole, such as the biometric system of attendance for its teachers in order to ensure their presence in colleges and ensure the participation of all teachers in the teaching/learning process.” Emphasising on the perquisites of teachers the affidavit read, “The teachers after the implementation of sixth pay commission have lucrative pay packets and are expected to fully justify the trust and confidence reposed by the society on them by working tirelessly for the betterment of the taught so as to prepare them for facing the challenges of life with confidence and knowledge.” The plea also stated that it seemed that the university was not implementing the biometric system under pressure from teachers’ unions. The university had tried to introduce the system in 2009, but had to hastily withdraw the order after Delhi University Teacher’s Association (DUTA) went on strike in protest.

This time around however, Delhi University has assured the Delhi High Court that it would adopt and implement the biometric attendance system for teachers to ensure punctuality. Following the assurance, the court disposed of the plea saying, “On the assurance given by the university, the court hopes and expects that biometric system of attendance would be introduced expeditiously.” The teachers are not expected to stall the move, which is aimed at uplifting the standards of teaching facilities.

 

Sakshi Gupta
[email protected] 

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DUB Speak

Freedom, Really?

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65 years of independence, 65 years since we shooed away the British. 65 years, since trains pulled up at railway stations, loaded with dead bodies. 65 years since everyone wanted to kill each other.

We, the youth of India, are a safe 60-something years away from all the violence, bloodshed and gore. But are we really free, in every sense of the word?

In a country where people wearing Armani sunglasses and holding Gucci bags look out of their BMW windows only to see beggars and slums, in a country where a law graduate’s throat was slit because she put up a fight against a rapist, in a country where brides are burnt in kitchen fires over dowry issues, in a country where honour killing is considered honourable, in a country where modernity is given the tag of promiscuity, in a country where politics is a mud-slinging arena, FREEDOM, in its truest form, cannot exist.

From the very beginning of the the day, to the very end- we find ourselves ensnared in various violations of the term freedom. From the haggling with the uncouth autowalas, to the formidable looking aunties pushing you out of the queue at the ticket counter; from the steady line of eyes peeping into the women’s compartment in the metro, to the judgement and competition between cousins; from the rude personal remarks your teacher makes at you before the whole class, to the back-stabbing between friends; from “customer care” services that put your call on hold for the next hour or so, to power cuts and unfair billing, we live each day only to discover it’s a man-eat-man world.

I refuse to believe that there is even a single teenager in this country, who at some point or the other, hasn’t considered “Lucknow wale chachaji aur delhi wali maamiji kya kahenge” before making a decision- be it about a piercing, a haircut, an outfit, or his/her career.

I refuse to believe there is a single teenager who has never felt a violation of his or her freedom of choice and expression.

DUTA (Delhi University Teacher’s Association) and DUSU (Delhi University Students Union) apparently did not get a say in the decision of semesterisation of undergraduate courses in Delhi University that was made a year back. And now, WE are the ones living it’s consequences (read: inflation of marks scam).

The great Indian illusion of independence and freedom shatters to reality every time a young girl is made to wear traditional clothes and forced to carry a tray of biscuits and chai into a drawing room full of prospective in-laws. It falls to pieces every time a rape survivor is blamed because her clothes were “provocative”. It breaks down even further every time parents tell their child not to play the guitar or play sports or paint or write, and practise chemical equations instead. It decays every time a mausiji or buaji wrinkles her nose at the idea of her nephew/niece pursuing a humanities course.

And what do the elderly have to say this?

“Bharat ke paas ek aisi cheez hai, jo videsh mein nahi milegi- hamaare sanskaar!”

“Ab aaj kal ke bacche raat mein pub jaayenge, toh ye sab toh hoga hi na!”

Girls being physically assaulted at a pub in Bangalore by the Sri Ram Sena activists, does not look like sanskaar to me. Couples deciding not to meet on Valentine’s Day for fear of being dragged to temples by the same Sena, does not look like sanskaar to me.

True, if sanskaar is to discriminate, violate, and suppress- then there is no country like India.

 

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Kirorimal College

KMC Professors Agitated over Showcause Notices

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The struggle by Kirori Mal College’s students and teachers against the VC and KMC Chairman Baleshwar Rai; and in support of their suspended principal, Dr. Bhim Sen Singh has developed into extensive protest marches and dharnas. The KMC Teachers’ Association has been staging a dharna for two days to oppose the functioning and “authoritarian decision making” of the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Dinesh Singh. The association issued a statement on Thursday, lamenting the manner in which Prof. Dinesh Singh has been handling the protests and especially showcause of two teachers. They also demanded for an autonomous and impartial body that would decide on the whole suspension issue.

“The DUTA executive condemns the autocratic manner in which the university administration has attacked teachers’ rights to protest, as evident in the case of the letters of the university registrar of 1st August 2012 and, subsequently of the acting Principal of Kirori Mal College to the teachers, denying the right of casual leave,” reads the official statement issued by KMC. DUTA has demanded for withdrawal of the showcause notices against post-holders of the staff-association. It further states the “attack on the staff association is an attack on DUTA. Therefore, DUTA demands immediate withdrawal of showcause notices against office-bearers of the staff association. DUTA shall not tolerate this continuous attack on our right to protest and will resort to direct action unless the letters are withdrawn.”

On being asked the acting Principal Dr. S.P Gupta about the showcause notices that were issued, he said that he had no idea about how all this happened and he did what he was directed to do by the VC. He never meant to suppress and undermine the rights of the Teachers’ Association.

All the teachers and students now require a permission slip to meet the new acting Principal in his office and entry without permission won’t be allowed. Students have not been attending classes as they have been active along with the teachers to stage protests and dharnas. A few students from the hostel were summoned and asked to end their protests and dharnas. There is agitation among students and teachers because the results of some of the university courses have still not been declared, the University recently announced some new fundamentally flawed Meta Courses, the M.A admissions are still not complete (the examinations being in November); and VC Singh is trying to focus on other trivial things like issuing showcause notices to teachers for no rhyme or reason.

 

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Kirorimal College

KMC Principal’s Suspension Causes Uproar and Protests

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The Principal of Kirori Mal College, Dr. Bhim Sen Singh was served a suspension order by the College Governing Body on 1st of August 2012 at 11:15 AM, soon after he leveled corruption and molestation charges against the college’s Governing Body Chairman, Mr. Baleshwar Rai, who is also a retired IAS officer. The decision was taken on the same day itself, in a meeting held with some members of the College Governing Body at the VC’s Office at 9 AM. The intense uproar and commotion among students and teachers of Kirori Mal College lead to a protest march to the VC Lawns. About 500 students along with the teachers staged a protest against the illegal and elitist functioning of the Delhi University Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Dinesh Singh and Mr. Baleshwar Rai. Subsequently, Dr. S.P Gupta who was appointed as the Vice-Principal by the Governing Body will function as the ‘acting principal’ of the college now.

The KMC Staff Association demanded an immediate withdrawal of the suspension order issued to the Principal which was probable because of his involvement in the anti-semester demonstrations and ‘mass-absenteeism’ on the first day of college of Semester II. They also called for suspension of the Chairman of KMC Governing Body in the light of his undemocratic behavior and the seriousness of charges of misappropriation of funds and molestation. The KMC Staff Association also abolished all charges of ‘mass absenteeism’ against themselves and the college Principal.

Students of Kirori Mal College along with their teachers who were fuming with rage also staged a protest against the two aforementioned, in front of the VC façade. To add to their fury, the Vice-Chancellor and his officials maintained a distance from the protestors. “SP Gupta, who has been made Principal, had been censured by the governing body. This is how you promote ‘goonda-gardi’ in a college,” says Dr. Bhim Sen Singh. KMC teachers amicably proposed to its members to go on a mass casual leave for the next two working days in protest against the “illegal decision” taken by the Governing Body “at the behest of the University”. But the right to take casual leave has been denied to the teachers of Kirori Mal College through a “Registrar-issued Letter”. Dr. Sudipto Ghosh (President, Staff Association) and Rudrashish Chakraborty (Secretary, Staff Association) have been served show-cause notices.

 

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Arts Faculty

DUTA stages dharna

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The Delhi University Teachers’ Association staged a protest in LSR today. They were protesting against the idea of establishing a Meta University floated by the VC, and of a four-year undergraduate programme, through the media, without placing the proposal before the Academic and Executive Councils for proper evaluation of the desirability or feasibility of such policy changes. Teachers from various DU colleges gathered outside the college cafeteria handing out pamphlets to get the support of students.

While the teachers are still upset over the recently introduced semester system and its effects on students as well as teachers, they feel this new proposal is despotic  and undemocratic.

In their written appeal to students, DUTA says that, “The experience of semesterized courses in the last one and a half years has confirmed our worst fears about severe academic dilution and adverse effect on teaching processes. Teachers are being forced to instruct students through modules that do not allow the time to engage with different levels of competence of different students, nor do these modules allow teachers to communicate a sense of fundamentals and depth of any academic discipline. To cloak the disastrous impact of semesterisation on the performance of students, the DU administration has resorted to irrational inflation of marks which has put a question mark on the credibility of our results which will result in devaluing our degree.”

Teachers already had been feeling undervalued as their opinions and protests were not taken into consideration during the finalizing of the University’s decision to semesterize undergraduate courses. According to Ms. Vijaya Venkatraman, who teaches Spanish at the GRS faculty of arts, “The semesterisation process saw the abolishment of democratic functioning in DU. DUTA protested but  no one paid heed, and just as we had feared, semester system led to simplification of exams and inflation of marks. Our second year students are worried that they wont be able to survive the competition in the job sector, which is like a blot on our reputation. The VC has decided to add this sudden ‘grandeur’ to the University without even taking the collective opinion of teachers.  We, as professionals, are sad that we can no longer operate our teaching the way we want to, which is why we want students on get on board with us for our cause.”

The teachers’ collective is demanding expansion of Government funding in higher education to meet the growing demand for the same. It is also resisting large-scale commercialization of higher education, as they believe that the role of education is to strengthen social and national integration of the country.

You can read DUTA’s charter of demands at: http://gaurnaveen.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/draft_charter-of-demands.pdf

 

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News

Alleged Marks Scam in DU

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According to Abha Dev Habib, of the DUTA, the “once so called ‘reform’ forced on the teaching community at the behest of the MHRD, the semester system at the undergraduate level has been categorically and unequivocally rejected by the teachers. The experience of semesterized courses in the last one and half years has confirmed our worst fears about severe academic dilution and adverse effect on teaching-processes and co-curricular activities. This has crippled the intellectual, cultural-emotional and holistic growth of students. The worst affected are students from disadvantaged backgrounds.”

It is being believed that to cloak the disastrous impact of semesterization on the performance of students, the DU administration has resorted to irrational inflation of marks which has put a question mark on the credibility of our results and will result in devaluing of the degree. The new moderation formula has worked against all students thus having the teachers at DU exercised over this marks scam.

The marks scam has purportedly happened at three levels:

(i) Meetings were held in many Departments to unofficially decide a reduced syllabus for setting exam papers. The question papers were made as easy, the format of the exam papers was changed giving students maximum chance.

(ii) The examiners were instructed to mark leniently.

(iii) The last straw on camel’s back was to moderate all marks by the same token. Earlier moderation was case-wise. This time, blanket moderation was done, without a prior and proper tabulation of results, and analysis of the same.

Nandita Narian of the Maths Department at St. Stephen’s College, who was also an examiner, tells how earlier in the meeting in the Maths Department, the syllabi were unofficially reduced and later there was imminent pressure from the DU Exam Branch to mark students leniently.

The proposal to semesterize the postgraduate courses was passed in Academic Council meeting of February 2008 and the decision was implemented from July 2009. The results of postgraduate courses, which have not been tampered by the DU administration to that extent, reconfirm the opinion that the semester system works against the inclusion policies. The failure rate has increased in the postgraduate Departments as students with disadvantaged backgrounds fail to cope in the semester system.

These issues have also been highlighted in the Memorandum of Protest by the examiners of the History department who have written to Dr. Jaggi, the Controller of Examinations saying that this “ we protest against this un- academic way of moderating results that has diluted academic standards and has made a mockery of the evaluation process undertaken seriously and sincerely by us.” and the memo was signed by 14 examiners of the same department.

Click on the following links for more information

Moderation Patterns in DU Final Exams– By Abha Dev Habib

Memorandum of Protest _History

 

 

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