BENGALURU: The move by Union Ministry for Human Resource Development (MHRD) to shift the regional office of National Council for Teachers Education (NCTE) from Bengaluru to Delhi, has met with opposition from southern states.
Managements of schools and colleges from southern states and other stakeholders have raised their voice against the MHRD decision. Even a few Members of the Legislative Council have decided to submit representation to HRD minister Prakash Javdekar requesting to retain the regional centre.
The regional centre located at Bengaluru caters to many states — Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Kerala, Pondicherry, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep. But now, with the decision to shift the centre to Delhi, the stakeholders have to head to Delhi for any work with NCTE.
As per the reason provided by the HRD ministry, all the regional officers are shifting to Delhi to take everything online. But, the stakeholders raised objection over this saying, “It is not that the teacher education institutions are located only in city limits. Majority of them are located in rural parts too, where doing everything online is not possible. Taking this into consideration, we demand the regional office to remain in Bengaluru.”
Speaking to The New Indian Express, a senior MLC from Karnataka, who has drafted the letter to the HRD minister, said, “NCTE regional office was established in Bengaluru with the vision to cater to the institutes located in southern states. The information about shifting the institute is hosted in the website of NCTE.” He even mentioned about the travelling distance and expenses. “The benefit of having a regional office is that the work gets done on time. The distance to Delhi from southern states is a lot in comparison to that from Bengaluru. When we look at the accommodation expenses, stakeholders need to stay back at least for two days to get their work done at Delhi,” explained the MLC.
“We have highlighted all these issues in the letter drafted to the HRD minister. Our request is to let them make transactions online, but the rest of the process should remain offline at regional offices,” said MLC.
The regional offices of NCTE were set up to lessen the burden of the NCTE with respect to procedure, process and monitoring of quality and standard at Teacher Education Institutions. Bengaluru NCTE regional office looks at these issues at southern states.