Mumbai University admin, not professors, may be correcting your answer sheets

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Is the Mumbai university that desperate to finish evaluation that it has roped in non-teaching staff to correct answer sheets in order to adhere to the July 31 deadline? That's the allegation. Experts are wondering why MU playing with careers of lakhs of students.

The varsity's record-breaking delay in declaring results has been criticised extensively, as is the quality of assessment work, with experts slamming it for only being focused on completing the target anyhow.

With just four days remaining for the university to meet the deadline set by the governor to declare the long-pending results, varsity officials have further expedited the work. Eyebrows are being raised at the inclusion of Sanjay Ratnaparkhi, a staff member of the Institute of Distance and Open Learning (IDOL) who looks after the administration of the department, for the assessment work.

"It is unclear whether he is allowed to correct papers as he has been involved in administrative work. Though appointments at that level are of people with educational qualification equal to those of professors, their duties don't involve academic work," said a senior professor.

A senior management professor from a reputed college, an approved evaluator for MU, said, "I am involved with the assessment work. Though I have been a faculty for management for several years now and have been taking different subjects in different semester, I am not assessing papers of a subject I have not taught for this semester."

When contacted, Deepak Vasave, director of examinations and evaluations at the university, denied the allegation. "We have not included any non-teaching staff in the evaluation process. It's not possible as appointment of all evaluators is done by the chairman of board of studies for all subjects. The specific staff named in the allegation is also an academician. He is academic director and also responsible for lectures and workshops conducted by IDOL for distance-learning students."

Race against time
For the next four days, colleges will remain closed, as professors have been told to devote all their time on assessment work. MU has issued another circular extending non-instructional days to affiliated colleges. This time, however, non-instructional days are only for faculties of law, commerce and arts, as a major part of assessment work is pending in these streams. A circular issued by the director of examinations and evaluations, reads, "Faculty of science and technology has completed 95 per cent work. Management and arts faculties have completed 90 per cent and 80 per cent of assessment work, respectively. However, assessment work in the faculties of law and commerce needs to be further expedited to meet deadline. Hence, non-instructional days are extended till July 31 for faculties of arts, law and commerce."