Thousands March Against Assault on Academic Institutions

In a massive show of solidarity, teachers, students and their families led by the Delhi University Teachers’ Association marched in thousands from Mandi House to Parliament Street on 30th May 2016. The large numbers in which people came showed a clear thumbs-down to the Government’s insidious attempts to cut jobs and deny promotions through its anti-education Gazette Notification.

The notification gravely impacts the workload of teachers through the newly proposed Academic Performance Indicators (API) that are to be used to ascertain their performance. Such a system not only reduces the number of permanent teaching positions, leading to a skewed student-teacher ratio but in turn, also affects the quality of teaching that is made available to the student by focusing on the quantity instead. It is believed that by introducing such retrogressive amendments to the UGC regulations, this Government is pushing the academic talent of the nation back to the trailing-end of the global knowledge society. The teachers of various universities along with their families marched to raise their voices against this assault.

The Delhi University Teachers Association through its resolution has asked for :

1)     Immediate withdrawal of the Amendments and a complete scrapping of the current API-system in the interests of the Teaching Fraternity and Public at large.

2)     Restoration of public spending on Higher Education, greater allocation to the UGC in Budget

3)     Release of the Second Tranche of teaching posts as promised under the OBC-Expansion Scheme to colleges and Universities and to expedite the process of filling up permanent vacancies.

4)     One-time exemption from NET for all PhD-holders who registered prior to 2009.

Teachers marched along with their family members. One of the teachers of Delhi University came with his kid who held the banner demanding removal of API.

The protestors marched with Umbrella saying “No to API”. The slogans called for rejection of the government which is anti-people and anti-academic institutions.

Heavy security arrangements were made to stop the participants from moving towards MHRD. The march culminated in a public meeting which was addressed by the DUTA President.

Photos: Trina Shankar