Over 20 DU colleges have no principal or governing body:
The new academic session at Delhi University (DU), is all set to start within few days and over 20 of its 70 colleges are being run by “officiating” or “acting” principals. The post at several top-DU colleges have been vacant for few years and they are being run by “acting” principals appointed as per university’s rules for a term of six months at the most, following which the post is supposed to be filled permanently, or the term is extended.
According to procedure, the responsibility of appointing principals lies both in the hands of the university as well as the college’s governing body. The post has to be advertised by the governing body and the university is supposed to set up a selection committee for interviews. But, due to absence of governing bodies in several colleges, the appointment has been stalled.
Later in April, DU has also released an online form so that candidates looking to apply for the post of Principal can apply to multiple colleges through the same application. The university states that approximately 15 colleges published an advertisement for this post but there has been no update since now in this regard as the colleges got busy with the admission process. The Government of Delhi has also written to the university to speed up the process so that the vacancies for the posts of principals can be filled as fast it could.
The colleges which are running without principals include top names such as, Hans Raj College, Shri Ram College of Commerce, Hindu College, Kirorimal College, Delhi College of Arts and Commerce, Kamala Nehru College and Ramjas College among others. The Delhi University Teachers Association (DUTA) has also made several attempts to communicate the situation to the Vice-Chancellor but to no hail.
In a letter written to the VC in June, DUTA president Nandita Narain had said: “Since the governing bodies of colleges are the appointing authority for both the Principal and teachers, it is essential that regular governing bodies for all the colleges are in place to ensure that the appointment process takes place in a smooth, time-bound and fair manner.” Teachers further said that the delay in the process of appointing principals was also causing a delay in the appointment of permanent faculty members and thousands of teachers were being forced to work on an ad-hoc basis without benefits and job security.
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