Tandon Committee report on deemed universities

• The committee invited all deemed-to-be-universities for presentations and face-to-face discussions in August and September 2009 in four sessions. A total of 126 institutions attended these sessions. The committee had sent questionnaires seeking all relevant information to these institutions well in advance.On the basis of their responses, the committee submitted its report on October 20, 2009
• Tandon Committee found several aberrations in the functioning of these universities. The committee concluded that only 38 of these universities justified their continuation as "deemed universities"; 44 institutions were deficient in some aspects, which needed to be rectified over a three-year period; and, finally, 44 institutions neither on past performance nor on their promise for the future had the attributes to retain their status as deemed-to-be-universities. Sixteen of these 44 institutions are in Tamil Nadu.
• The committee found "undesirable management architecture" where families rather than professional academics controlled the functioning of institutions. Several institutions were engaged in thoughtless introduction of unrelated programmes and proliferation of degrees beyond the mandate of the original terms of grant of deemed-to-be-university status. It also found very little evidence of noticeable efforts by some institutions in regard with emerging areas of knowledge.
• With the notable exception of some publicly funded institutions, very few institutions could produce evidence of "quality" research in terms of publications in leading high-impact journals in respective fields.
• Lack of commitment towards research and irresponsible exercise of power with regard to admission, intake capacity, programmes and fee structure were found to be other attributes of such institutions. Many of these, which were once colleges, increased their intake capacity disproportionately and in some cases exponentially in relation to the qualified faculty strength and other academic infrastructure.
• In several institutions, undergraduate and postgraduate programmes had been fragmented with concocted nomenclatures. Several institutions have prescribed fee structures considerably higher than those recommended by the official fee structure committees.
• The Tandon Committee members also became members of the task force constituted by the Centre on November 16, 2009, to prepare an action plan to safeguard the interests of students enrolled in institutions whose deemed-to-be-university status was proposed to be revoked in the public interest. The task force recommended that all pre-existing colleges not found suitable for the status of deemed-to-be-university should revert to the status quo ante as an affiliated college of the State university so that students would be able to complete their ongoing courses and obtain degrees from the affiliating university.
• Where an institution is unable to obtain affiliation, it suggested that every effort should be made to facilitate migration or re-enrolment of students to equivalent or similar courses in other institutions.
• The task force made it clear that the entire cost of migration and rehabilitation of affected students should be at the expense of the managements of the failed institutions and must come from the corpus fund that was required to be maintained in respect of each under UGC guidelines.
• Centre accepted the reports of the Tandon Committee and the task force. The announcement led to widespread concern and unrest among the students of these universities. The right course for the Centre might have been to place these reports in the public domain, invite public response, and then take a decision.