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HC stays UGC order on distance education- 1-Sep-2015
Chennai: Thousands of students who have enrolled themselves in the distance education programmes offered by the Annamalai University can now heave a sigh of relief! Madras High Court has stayed a University Grants Commission (UGC) order keeping in abeyance grant of sanction for Annamalai Univeresity’s 259 programmes under the Distance Education mode for 2015-16 academic year.
Justice MM Sundresh passed the interim order on a petition by the University based in Chidambaram and issued notice to the UGC and its affiliated unit Distant Education Bureau (DEB), which had passed the August 14, 2015 order, returnable within eight weeks. The UGC had cancelled the recognition granted to the university’s distance education courses for the academic year 2015-16.
The DEB had in its order informed the University that it has kept in abeyance grant of sanction for commencement of 259 programmes through the Distance Education mode. The University applied for grant of recognition/approval for conducting 259 Distance Education programmes, including 162 offered in the previous year. But it was informed by the UGC and the DEB that recognition for distance education courses offered by 31 universities, including Annamalai University, across the country had been cancelled for 2015-16. The petitioner submitted that the order did not mention anywhere the word ‘cancellation’ of permission and only said that it has kept in abeyance (sanction) till a final judgment was delivered on an appeal pending in court.
The university contended that without cancellation or de-recognition or disapproval of the permission enjoyed by it for several decades, the UGC cannot put it under ‘No admission Category’ for 2015-16. Stating that admissions for distance education mode had already been done, the petitioner said it was not given any opportunity before passing the order.
Annamalai University, represented by its Registrar (in-charge) K Arumugam, submitted that in 2012, the UGC through its letter dated August 21, 2012 informed the petitioner that the territorial jurisdiction of State Universities, both private and government, for offering programmes distance mode could not go beyond the boundaries of the State. The decision was challenged by the university before the HC in which the court set aside UGC’s decision through an order dated March 12, 2013, restraining UGC from interfering with the right of the petitioner in conducting distance mode education courses. Subsequently, in 2015 the UGC preferred an appeal to stay the operation of the Single Judge. While admitting the appeal, a Division Bench of the court held that all the admissions made by the university in the distance education mode for centres outside the territorial jurisdiction, shall be subject to the final decision of the pending appeal, Arumugam added.
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