KOCHI:The Maharaja’s College Samrakshana Samithi, an organisation of old students and teachers, will launch an agitation on May 12 urging the government to review its decision to grant autonomous status to the College.
The agitation will be launched at a convention to be inaugurated on the campus by former Education Minister M A Baby. The function will be presided over by writer M K Sanu.
The decision was taken at the executive council meeting of the Samithi held the other day.
Office-bearers of the organisation alleged that the government did not consult the stakeholders, including students, teachers, old students’ associations and the people of Kochi, while taking decision on granting autonomy to the College. The Samithi officials warned that if autonomy is granted, Maharaja’s College would become a high-profile college - similar to a self-financing college -that provides education to upper class students only. “Academic autonomy is also a green signal to start self -financing courses,” they said.
“Entrusting the control of the college to a governing council, comprising nominees of the government, will adversely affect the legacy of a college that has a tradition of more than one century. It is also an attempt to take control of the Maharaja’s campus, which has made its mark by facilitating modern thinking and creative intervention in social issues,” they said. CPM state committee member C N Mohanan, former MP Sebastian Paul, CPM area committee secretary T N Seenu Lal, AKGCT state president K Ramakrishnan, AKGCT general secretary K K Damodaran, NGO Union state secretariat member P Krishnaprasad, NGO Union district president Geevarghese, KSTA state committee member Sajeevan, Cochin University Employees’ Association general secretary Anil Radhakrishnan, DYFI district president Arun Kumar, AKGCT state vice-president Omana Pankan, AKGCT state committee member Santhosh T Varghese, AKGCT district secretary M S Murali, AKGCT district president K Anil Kumar, Samithi convener K Jayakumar, SFI district secretary Mohammed Fasal and University Union former general secretary Vishnu Venugopal spoke.