Union Human Resources Development (HRD) Minister Smriti Irani faced on her recent visit to Guru Tegh Bahadur Khalsa College, Delhi. She was invited to inaugurate the newly constructed teaching-learning center in the college premises.
As she came to inaugurate the center, she faced protest against her by the DU teachers. It came as the teachers gathered outside the university's gate and tried to block Irani's entry into the college. It was the inauguration of the Guru Angad Dev Teaching Learning Centre which has been set up under the Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya National Mission on Teachers and Teaching. This was a HRD Ministry initiative for betterment of teaching. The teachers were protesting against the newly released UGC norms to determine their academic performances.
"The new Gazette notification has increased the workload for assistant professors from 16 hours of direct per week which includes tutorials as well, to 18 hours, plus another six of tutorials, bringing the total up to 24 hours. Similarly, the work hours of associate professors have been increased from 14 to 22 hours", a teacher who was protesting, said.The teachers have argued that the amendments to UGC regulations recently , will lead to job-cuts to the approximate of 50 per percent and will witness exponential decrease in student-teacher ratio in higher education. The teachers have also abstained from evaluation of undergraduate examination papers and have boycotted the admission process which is in full swing these days.
Police
officials detained around 45 teachers for this protest. For more such updates,
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