Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Vice Chancellor Santishree D Pandit on Tuesday opposed the University Grants Commission (UGC) draft Guidelines for Implementation of Reservation Policy in Higher Education Institutes and said that it must be a “mistake.”
She emphasised that there are enough Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), Other Backward Classes (OBC) and Economically Weaker Section (EWS) candidates for reserved faculty positions in universities.
This comes after UGC suggested de-reserving faculty positions, meant for SC, ST and OBC aspirants if sufficient reserved candidates are unavailable.
Speaking to the new agency, the VC asserted that JNU follows the government of India’s policy for the recruitment of teachers and that the “Modi government has not given any document on the reservation.”.
Recently, the University Grants Commission’s draft on Reservation Policy in Higher Education caused furore as it suggested de-reserving faculty positions meant for SC, ST, and OBC aspirants if sufficient reserved candidates are unavailable. “I don’t think UGC has the power to make such changes… So I think this must have been a mistake; I don’t know. But in JNU, we are very clear that there was no de reservation of any post, and let me also reiterate that in JNU, since I came in the last two years, the highest number of reserved category faculty have been recruited,” she said.
“I would not agree with this saying that candidates are not available. I think the way to resolve that would be rather to either broaden the specialisation for professorship; yes, we are not getting people in every category, including the open category,” she added.
The draft guidelines were released in the last week of December.