363 colleges receive NAAC accreditation in one year

Mumbai: As many as 363 colleges across Maharashtra have obtained National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) rating within a year of the state government’s step of threatening restrictions on new admissions for colleges without an NAAC rating. The state is now home to the maximum number of NAAC-accredited educational institutions in the country. An additional 240 colleges have submitted applications to NAAC.

The higher education department had issued an order to universities across the state to de-affiliate colleges without NAAC assessment. In February, the state government directed all institutions to register and submit institutional information for quality assessment (IIQA) to the NACC office to start NACC evaluation and re-evaluation by March 31.

“Taking this as a serious warning, educational institutions started applying to NAAC,” said Vikas Chandra Rastogi, principal secretary, higher and technical education department. “To fast-track the applications, the state government launched the ‘Paris sparsh’ scheme. Within a year, 363 institutions completed their NAAC, and 240 colleges submitted their proposals.” Rastogi was speaking at the workshop arranged by the Public Relations Department and the Bal Apte Study Center at the University of Mumbai on understanding the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.

As per data published on the NAAC website on May 19, the state has 35 universities and 1,922 colleges with NAAC accreditation. “Maharashtra is the top state in the country with NAAC-accredited higher education institutions,” said Rastogi. “With this, we are assuring quality education in the state.”

While explaining the state’s readiness in implementation of the NEP, Rastogi said, “There are 157 autonomous colleges in the state, and recently 25 colleges have been given the status of empowered autonomous colleges. Very soon, we will also be coming up with guidelines for cluster universities for academic flexibility.”

Rastogi also informed the audience that the state government had started filling up faculty positions. “Six hundred and ninety-seven positions have been filled till now out of 2,088 approved positions, and a no objection certificate has been given to fill around 700 positions,” he said.

Rastogi said that to raise awareness about NEP in the state, the government had decided to hold NEP week between July 20 and July 27 across state universities. During this week, academics and industry will be able to sign MOUs and other partnerships.

Professor Vinod Mohitkar, director of technical education, said, “Taking a progressive step to implement NEP in engineering colleges, the state has formed a committee and decided on a framework for engineering education.”