Dharamshala: For obtaining easy funds, Himachal Pradesh University in collusion with the state government has played with the future students by implementing RUSA (Rashtriya Uchhtar Shiksha Abhiyan) in haste, Anurag Thakur, the MP from Hamirpur has alleged.
“Students from Himachal Pradesh, who have pursued their graduation courses under RUSA are unable to apply for postgraduate courses in Delhi, Punjab, Chandigarh and many other universities as the RUSA degrees are not being recognised,” said Thakur in a written communique.
He adds, “to make matters worse, Himachal Pradesh University is raising fees as well has plans to introduce RUSA system to post graduate courses as well.”
Pointing out the delays in declaring results, in some case by as much as 3 years Thakur says, “No justification could be given for delaying results for as long as 3 years. So now, if a 3rd year graduate gets to know he hasn’t cleared a 1st year course, he/she would return and wait for additional years to complete these courses again.”
Thakur says that with the future of the first batch of RUSA graduates uncertain, he has approached the ministry of human resource and development (HRD) and asked it to intervene by directing Delhi, Punjab, Chandigarh and other universities to entertain admission applications of students from HPU.
Launched in 2013, RUSA – the centrally sponsored scheme, was for providing strategic funding to state run institutions of higher education. The funding pattern was 65:35 for general category states and 90:10 for special category states.
Himachal being a special category state obtained Rs 100 crore funding for moving to the RUSA scheme.
Prime objectives of introducing RUSA was to improve the overall quality of state institutions by ensuring conformity to prescribed norms and standards and adopt accreditation as a mandatory quality assurance framework.
Arvind Sharma is an award winning bi-lingual journalist with more than 20 years of experience.
He has worked with Divya Himachal, Dainik Jagran, Dainik Bhasker, Vir Partap, Ajit and PTI.
In 2010, he was conferred the Himachal Kesri journalism award. He reports on the Tibetan Government in Exile, politics, sports, tourism and other topics. He lives in Dharamshala.
