PU principals meet to discuss issues pertaining to students

Ludhiana: Various issues ranging from difficulties in applying for new courses, admission of students, and students dropping out in the middle of the session were some of the concerns discussed during the meeting of the principals of Panjab University’s affiliated colleges. The meeting was held at Panjab University Regional Centre (PURC) on Sunday. Nearly 75 principals from various government and non-government degree, education, and constituent colleges met to discuss the various problems being faced by the colleges.

Dinesh Sharma, general secretary of PU Principal’s Association and principal of RSD College Ferozepur said: “Colleges are facing difficulties applying for new courses and subjects for the year, which need to be streamlined by the university. Besides this, principals those who have been appointed recently have an issue with the government that they were not given full payscales, and even the approvals of a few principals are pending, which need to be given immediate attention.”

Highlighting some issues related to students, Sharma said: “The post-matric scholarship schemes received from the welfare department of the state government for SC and ST students is also a concern for principals.” RS Jhanji, fellow PU and principal of AS Khanna College raised the issue of migrations and dropout of students. He said: “The dropout is much higher as compared to previous years. This has disturbed the revenue model of colleges. The colleges would face a financial crunch, and it would be difficult to pay salary to staff this year. The issues need to get redressal, and the regulatory body of the university to act and find a mechanism.”

While suggesting a solution, Jhanji said: “We need to look for options like vocational courses and skill-oriented programmes to be introduced liberally, where the regulatory body should encourage colleges.” After the meeting, a common agenda was framed and they would write to VC Raj Kumar and DPI Colleges Punjab to fix a meeting and chart an action plan that could taken at the earliest for the speedy redressal for the problems.

Office-bearers election

Election was held for office-bearers for the session 2019-20. NR Sharma principal, PU constituent colleges. Guru Har Sahai was elected president of the Panjab University Principals’ Association (PUPA). Neena Seth Pajni, Gobindnagar Public College Alour, Khanna; Savita Uppal, Arya College, Ludhiana; were elected as vice-president and senior vice-president respectively. Dinesh Sharma, RSD College, Ferozepur; and Tarlok Bandhu, Guru Nanak Khalsa College of Education, Muktsar Sahib; were elected as general secretary and joint secretary respectively. Dharam Singh of Government College Ludhiana was elected as treasurer.

RS Jhanji, SS Sangha, Iqbal Sandhu, and Kuldip Singh were chosen as the members of the advisory committee. Nine principals from various affiliated colleges, including Narinder Sidhu, Sunil Khosla, Surjit Sidhu, Kamal Preet Kaur, Surinder Thakur, Anurag Asija, Rajinder Sekhon, Monika Verma, Kuldeep Kaur Dhaliwal, and Aman Deep Kaur were unanimously elected as members of the executive council.


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