Punjab: Centralised admission portal row: JAC to boycott exam duties from Wednesday, to protest from June 1
The Joint Action Committee on Monday accused Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann of backtracking from his commitment that proposed centralised admission portal will be withdrawn
In a stand-off emerging between state government and the colleges, Joint Action Committee (JAC), comprising of aided and un-aided colleges’ managements, principals’ associations of three state universities, Punjab Chandigarh Colleges Teachers Union (PCCTU) on Monday accused Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann of backtracking from his commitment that proposed centralised admission portal will be withdrawn.
They said CM Mann made a commitment during Jalandhar by-election campaign that colleges are free to make their own admissions and government will not interfere into their admission schedule, while centralised admission portal, proposed by the department of higher education, will be withdrawn. “On getting the assurance we suspended our protest rallies during election time,” said JAC head, Rajinder Mohan Singh Chhina.
Addressing mediapersons after JAC’s meeting on Monday, Chhina said, “It was never expected that CM and his two ministers, whom the JAC delegation had met on May 3 and May 4, would backtrack”.
The JAC while condemning various “threatening letters” received by colleges during last two days, said that no college will register on the centralised portal. “The government is failing to understand concerns of colleges. A centralised portal is direct attack on the autonomy of colleges,” Chhina said.
Chhina said the JAC has decided to intensify the agitation jointly, as it is a matter of survival for the colleges, he added.
“All the college teachers will boycott duties for the examinations and evaluations of the three state universities including Panjab University, Chandigarh; Punjabi University, Patiala and Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU), Amritsar. We never wanted to take extreme steps and we are concerned about the students but dictatorial attitude of the government is forcing us to take extreme steps,” said the JAC members, which includes Principals Association (GNDU) head Gurdev Singh, and Punjab & Chandigarh Teachers Union (PCCTU) president Dr Vinay Sofat.
Apart from this, JAC also decided to organise protests at all 140 colleges in Punjab and Chandigarh from June 1 onwards.
The colleges, they said, were already witnessing shortfall in admissions due to flight of the youth to foreign countries. There are numerous ill-effects of the portal on the colleges financially and administratively.
