New Delhi
The BA (Programme) classes for Delhi University’s School of Open Learning (SOL) students were cancelled for the second week in a row on Sunday, prompting students to call for a protest on Monday.
“The classes for BA (Programme) students was cancelled at all centres without SOL administration even caring to notify the students. Out of the 34 centres, classes were not held in 20 for BA (Programme),” said Harish Gautam, a final-year student at SOL, a member of the students’ outfit Krantikari Yuva Sangathan (KYS).
“Thousands of first year students of BA (Programme)had reached their personal contact programme (PCP) centres in the morning — some as early as 8am — but were forced to return after being told that classes had been cancelled,” he said.
Students blamed the “unpreparedness” of the administration, after the university asked SOL to switch from annual to semester mode in August. The decision was taken to ensure parity with regular DU colleges, which adopted choice based credit system (CBCS) in 2015.
Adarsh Mishra, who enrolled for BA programme at SOL this year, said he travelled from Nangloi to Swami Shraddhanand College, more than 20km away. “We received a text message on September 1 saying our counselling would be held on September 8. When that was cancelled, we were not informed that there would be no classes on this Sunday as well. The administration informed us around 5pm on Sunday evening that there would be no classes,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Adarsh Mishra, who enrolled for BA programme at SOL this year, said he travelled from Nangloi to Swami Shraddhanand College, more than 20km away. “We received a text message on September 1 saying our counselling would be held on September 8. When that was cancelled, we were not informed that there would be no classes on this Sunday as well. The administration informed us around 5pm on Sunday evening that there would be no classes,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Director of SOL, CS Dubey, said the classes for BA (Programme) were not scheduled to take place at all on Sunday. “B.Com classes were scheduled to take place today (Sunday) and they did take place,” Dubey said.
An official from SOL, on condition of anonymity, said that earlier the session used to start in October. But in order to give students enough time to study for their semester examinations the session was preponed to September this year. “However, the notification for this came very late and now we are running against time,” the official added.