DU teachers oppose ‘rambo-ish’ South Campus inspections, flag threat to college autonomy

Delhi University teachers’ groups and officer-bearers of DU Teachers’ Association (DUTA) have raised strong objections against what they termed a “rambo-ish inspection round” conducted by the director of the South Campus in a few colleges to check whether classes were being held.

In an official memorandum addressed to the vice-chancellor Yogesh Singh, members of the DU Executive Council (EC), Finance Committee (FC), Academic Council (AC), and the DUTA Executive said that the inspections were carried out on a restricted holiday (RH) and were not in line with the federal structure and statutory governance framework of the university.

Ordinance XVIII clearly entrusts the responsibility of conducting the classes with a Principal -in Staff Council. Clause 9 (e) of Constitution, Rules and Regulations of Governing Bodies of Colleges (Ref N EC 66, dr 27.4.1963) says, 'The Principal shall be responsible for the organisation of teaching and co-curricular activities of the College.'

The teachers argued that under existing rules, the responsibility of conducting classes lies with college principals, not university-level officials. Citing the ordinance, the teachers said “such an inspection round will lead to the dilution of the authority”. “Thus, in such a scenario, any follow up action on this basis also suffers from the similar statutory discrepancies”.

The signatories highlighted several systemic issues and said DU colleges were already grappling with faculty shortage and infrastructure constraints, particularly after the EWS expansion and implementation of the four-year undergraduate programme (FYUP) under the National Educational Policy (NEP 2020), without adequate funding and recruitment.

“With so many challenges of the initial days of the reopening, the time tables are in the process of getting stabilised," they said.

They further pointed out that the inspections coincided with Makar Sankranthi, a restricted holiday in Delhi and a full holiday in neighbouring states like Uttar Pradesh.

They urged the vice-chancellor Yogesh Singh to take steps to preserve the autonomy of college governance, and warned that such “policing approach” could adversely affect teachers’ morale.

The memorandum was signed by DU EC, FC, AC members, including Rajpal Singh Pawar, JL Gupta, Bimalendu Theerthankar, Mamta Chaudhary, Ramkishore Yadav, Pawan Kumar , TN Ojha, Priyam Barooah, and Dhanraj Meena.