Karnatak University battles to ease crisis

Allaying the apprehensions that the Karnatak University, Dharwad, would close down several courses that faced a shortage of students, vice-chancellor H B Walikar at the weekend said, such courses would be suspended for the academic year. This is contrary to reports in a section of the media that the departments would be closed down.

Referring to media reports that the varsity was planning to close down 10 departments which have less than 10 students offering the subject, Walikar said he held meetings with teachers of these departments and promised them that the departments would not be closed.

However, the teachers should put in extra work and should not demand additional guest faculty if the number of students is less than 10 in any of the department, he said.

Linguistics, Urdu, Marathi, French, Sanskrit and Philosophy departments were the ones that faced the threat of closure as these courses have seen a steep decline in the number of students opting for these subjects.

'Daily wagers to be removed in phased manner'
The cash-strapped Karnatak University is seeking to do away with the 'excess' daily wage employees. This will be done in a phased manner, said vice chancellor Walikar.

Replying to queries from reporters, Walikar said, the university had as many as 599 employees on daily wages and some of them have been working with the university for the last 15-16 years. The services of many of these employees were not required and their continuation in job has only burdened the varsity financially, the V-C said. He informed that there are 213 are computer operators and of them 160 do not know the basics of computer.

"The varsity will chalk out a strategy to weed out these unproductive employees. There will be a test for the computer operators next month and those who do not pass will be terminated immediately," Walikar asserted.

The Vice-Chancellor said, the varsity is getting adequate funds from UGC for infrastructure and academic activities.

However, the area of concern is the salary grant. The varsity needs Rs 168 crore every year towards the salary of the employees (teaching and non-teaching).

The varsity is generating Rs 15 crore to Rs 20 crore from its internal resources and the government has made budgetary allocation of Rs 83 crore for salary. "As a new government is formed, a proposal has been submitted to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and Higher Education Minister R V Deshpande, to release an additional Rs 48 crore to the varsity," he elaborated.