Academicians are not happy by the center's move to replace the UGC with HECI and said that politicians should not be involved in the academic matters. Last week, HRD ministry released a draft in which it said to replace the UGC Act, 1951 with the Higher Education Commission of India (HECI).
The HRD ministry has placed the draft in the public domain and has invited the feedback from the stakeholders. According to the draft, HECI will only focus on the academic matters related to the institutions and monetary grants will be under the control of the HRD ministry.
As of now, the move has invited thumbs down from the academicians as they accused the government of interfering with the academic matters.
“When the ministry says it will take charge of funding, we do not know if the administrative work related to the funding will be done by them or the [new body]. In either case, it is not advisable for funding to remain with the ministry. It is best for the regulatory body to release funds because funding is based on an academic exercise and they can monitor its use. And I think the autonomous character of an institution like the University Grants Commission should be maintained. The draft law recognizes the importance of autonomy, but it is not a question of the autonomy of colleges and universities, it is also that of the commission,” said Prof. Sukhadeo Thorat, former UGC Chairman.
"It is clear that as per the new norms, the authorization is going to be given and maintained not only on the basis of what a university has at that particular point of time, but it would be contingent on achieving a set of goals over a decade. We can expect these goals to be about resource-generation, a burden that will surely be passed on as fees and a cutback in recruitment, and most likely, by introducing all kinds of rubbish, short-term courses. This means compliance with the Center's diktats will be essential from the word go, for both the older and newer universities," said Prof. Ayesha Kidwai, JNU.