Bihar government opposes 4-yr degree programme under CBCS proposed by governor

The Bihar government has opposed the proposal by Raj Bhavan that all state universities will introduce four-year bachelor’s degree courses under the choice-based credit system (CBCS) from the coming academic session this year.

On Thursday, KK Pathak, additional chief secretary, department of education, wrote a letter to Shailendra Shukla, officer on special duty (judicial), governor’s secretariat, with a copy to all the university vice-chancellors, seeking reconsideration of the governor’s letter for launching four-year graduation programme under the CBCS.

He said the Bihar government does not support the aforementioned four-year programme and requested the chancellor’s office to reconsider their May 15 letter.

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“Given the circumstances, the state government is of the view that the universities should first complete the ongoing courses, particularly the delayed ones,” says Pathak’s letter sent on Friday.

A decision regarding this was taken by Raj Bhawan in April after a high-level meeting chaired by Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar. A letter regarding the same was drafted in May.

Currently, most colleges in the state are running three-year degree courses.

Governor Arlekar, who is also the chancellor of state universities, had approved the Ordinance and Regulations for the Bachelor of Arts/Science/Commerce (Honours) 4-year programme under CBCS as per University Grant Commission (UGC) Regulation (Curriculum and Credit Framework for Undergraduate Programmes).

Soon after assuming charge, he had asked vice-chancellors of all universities to not only to streamline the derailed exam calendar but also implement the four-year graduation programme with CBCS, a pre-requisite in most of the central universities and premiere institutions, from the present session itself to ensure uniformity in the state.

He had also asked the VCs of the state universities to “stick to a uniform exam calendar” and publication of results for the convenience of the students and sought status reports with specific timelines for clearing the exam backlog even if it required clubbing different sessions.

After Raj Bhawan approved the ordinance the universities began the process, while experts completed the curriculum and syllabus for the first two semesters.

Meanwhile, the new pattern has also been passed by the academic council of the universities and even the Patna University has initiated the admission process.

The Raj Bhagwan’s move was seen as significant as no universities in Bihar had managed to implement the CBCS and semester system at the undergraduate level.

Even at the post-graduate level, except Patna University, none could implement even a semester system till 2000 on one pretext or the other, the reason is a huge shortage of teachers due to just one centralised recruitment in the last two decades. Now most universities have started it at the PG level, but the session remains delayed.

“However, with the state government disapproving the move of the governor, there could be confusion for universities at the start of the academic session. The governor has been keen on introducing the four-year programme from this year itself. It remains to be seen how he responds to the state government’s refusal to accept the change,” said KB Sinha, working president of the Federation of University Teachers’ Association of Bihar.

He added that it is not a good sign for the state universities.

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In his letter, Pathak has written that most of the universities are behind in terms of the academic calendar and the capacity of the universities to conduct new programmes has to be seen in totality, particularly in terms of their ability to conduct and complete the existing ongoing programmes.

“The state government is of the view that the universities of Bihar presently ‘do not hold the capacity’ in terms of faculty, support staff and necessary classroom infrastructure, to take up any new programme given that their existing regular courses are running behind schedule. The delay with respect to the existing 3-year graduate programmes extends from a few months to more than a year. The post-graduate programmes are even more delayed,” says the letter.

Maintaining that the state government is taking every step to ensure that the universities become up to date with respect to their academic calendar within the next few months, Pathak has written that it proposes to issue an examination schedule, vide an official gazette for all the Universities under Section 30 of the Bihar State University Act, 1976.

“The Universities have to adhere to the said gazette notification and the timelines mentioned therein. The gazette notification shall contain all existing ongoing graduate programmes, post-graduate programmes, vocational courses and other programmes being conducted by the universities. Thus, the state government expects the universities to strictly adhere to the gazette notification likely to be issued shortly and not to conduct any examination not duly notified by the state government,” it adds.