THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: After a marathon seven-and-a-half hour discussion, the Kerala Assembly passed the Kerala Technological University Bill 2015. Earlier in the day, the state government had announced that the university would be named APJ Abdul Kalam Technological University.
Education Minister P K Abdu Rabb said the new institution will give prominence to “outcome-based education”. Accusing the government of intending to surrender the proposed university to commercial interests, the Opposition staged a walk out.
The Bill had been presented in the House in June this year and referred to the subject committee on education. On Wednesday, the Bill was discussed along with the subject committee report. Several changes have been effected.
The decision to appoint a ‘chairman’ for the university has been scrapped. Representation of the student community and faculty has been ensured in the university administration. Also, in the place of three nominated MLAs in the governing council, there would be five MLAs elected on the basis of party representation in the House. Opposition members questioned the rationale of naming the university after Kalam when majority of the affiliated colleges were private self-financing in nature. The government was also criticised for not considering the Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT) as a more ideal institution to carry Kalam’s name.
M A Baby of the CPM, conveying his dissent to the bill, said several sections in the bill allow commercial interests to control the university. “Of the 173 colleges under it, 137 are private self-financing colleges. Only 24 can be said to be controlled by the government in any form,” Baby said. “The university is in reality a private university, even if technically it is not so,” CPM’s G Sudhakaran said.
Members, both ruling and Opposition, also objected to the inclusion of a nominated member in the board of governors, who was an industrialist from an MNC that had a turnover of not less than `1,000 crore. The members, including Congress’s V T Balaram, pointed out that such a clause was unbecoming of a bill dealing with education and should be removed.
