'End of Academic Autonomy': Gujarat Public Universities Bill Draws Flak
30 September 2023 | The Wire
Gujarat University Tower Building. Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Jigar Brahmbhatt/ CC BY-SA 3.0 DEED.
New Delhi: Criticism against the recently passed Gujarat Public Universities Bill has been growing, with Opposition Congress accusing the state government, led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), of killing the autonomy of universities and transferring the powers to administer them to the state government. The Gujarat Assembly passed the controversial Bill on September 16, bringing 11 public universities in the state under the ambit of the said Bill and unifying different laws that governed the functioning of different universities.
The controversy stems from the sweeping changes the Bill wants to bring in. It intends to replace the existing senates and syndicates in the universities with a new system in place called the ‘board of management’, which will be given full executive control and be the final decision-making authority of a university to decide the policy course as well as to carry out all administrative work. This essentially means that there would not be any elections or any political activity by the student wings of any political party.