HYDERABAD: The biggest universities in the fledgling state of Telangana - Osmania and Kakatiya - face the problem of losing Central government grants, which run into hundreds of crores, further casting a debilitating effect on the already cash- starved institutions.
Reason: Due to lack of regular vice-chancellors, the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) reaccreditation which is due for both universities has remained a non-starter.
While the accreditation of OU ended in February 2013, KU’s accreditation concluded in June 2014.
The University Grants’ Commission(UGC) 2012 guidelines clearly stipulates that universities which fail to get NAAC accreditation by April 1, 2015 will not get any financial assistance from their end thereafter.
The request from Osmania University for inviting an inspection team from NAAC to get reaccreditation was made only after the NAAC deadline ( June 1, 2014).
Consequently, the NAAC did not send a ‘Letter of intent’ till date, informing that the university would be reinspected for granting NAAC accreditation.
On the other hand, despite KU placing its requisition before the NAAC deadline, failure of correspondence between university officials and NAAC led to the university not receiving any ‘Letter of intent’ from the other side.
Among state-run universities in the state, only Osmania and Kakatiya universities have been accorded the prestigious National Assessment and Accreditation Council’s top grading points. More importantly, of all the universities in the united AP it was only Osmania University which achieved the rare feat of receiving ‘University with potential for excellence’ (a position beyond A).
On the other side, Kakatiya University has been honoured with ‘A’ grade. Universities are graded based on their academic and non-academic activities in the order of A,B, C, D by NAAC.
Telangana State Federation of University Teachers’ Associations (TSFUTA) chairman Prof B Satyanarayana blamed the inaction of the state government in dealing with the issue.
‘’Presently, six universities in the state do not have regular VCs and are being headed by IAS officers. Had there been regular VCs, this situation would not have arisen,” he pointed out.
Further, he said the government has to take swift action in appointing regular VCs to pursue the Central government in receiving NAAC accreditation and consequently Central funds.