INDIRAGANDHINATIONALOPENUNIVERSITY
Distance Education Council
Minutes of the 32ndmeeting of the Distance Education Council held on Wednesday, the 5thAugust, 2009 at 02.00 PM in the Board Room, Block-8, IGNOU Campus, New Delhi-110068.
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The following members were present:
- Prof. V.N. Rajasekharan Pillai, VC, IGNOU Chairman
- Dr. R.K Chauhan, Secretary, UGC Member
- Prof. Naresh Dadhich, VC, VMOU Member
- Prof. Kalyani Ambuchelvan, VC, TNOU Member
- Prof. H.A Ranganath, Director, NAAC Member
- Prof. P. Purushotam Rao, OsmaniaUniversity Member
- Prof. Arun Sadhu, Former Professor of PuneUniversity Member
- Prof. (Ms.) Shafiqa Parveen, Director(CDE),University Member
of Kashmir
- Dr. Xavier Alphonse, S.J., Director, ICRDCE Member
- Prof. K.R. Srivathsan, PVC, IGNOU Member
- Prof. Manjulika Srivastava, Director, DEC Secretary
The following members could not attend the meeting:
Prof. Mushirul Hasan, VC, Jamia Millia Islamia, Prof. Mohammad Mian, Director(ASCDE), Jamia Millia Islamia,; Shri R.P Agrawal, Secretary, MHRD,
Prof. A.K Bakshi, Director, ILLL, University of Delhicould not attend the meeting.
The Chairman, Distance Education Council welcomed all the members. In his opening remarks he briefly dwelt upon the structural changes that are coming up in the higher education system.
Thereafter, the following agenda items were taken:
Item No. 32.1: To confirm the Minutes of the 31st Meeting of the Distance Education Council held on 17th March, 2009 and action taken report
The minutes of the 31st Meeting was circulated to all the Council Members. The comments received fro m the MHRD were noted and with this the minutes of the 31st Meeting of the Council were confirmed. Thereafter the Action Taken Report was presented by the Director, DEC.
Item No. 32.2: To consider and approve the recommendation of the Grant Allocation Committee held on 17th July, 2009.
The members observed that there has been a drastic reduction in the DEC grant bynearly 50% as compared to the previous year report, specially at a time when the financial outlay for higher education in the country has been enhanced by nearly nine times. Therefore the MHRD should at least double the grant that it has allocated for DEC during the current financial year, particularly for enabling OUs to adopt ICT facilitates and expand their operations to contribute to the growth in the GER during the current plan period.
Item No. 32.3: To consider and approve the recommendations of the Expert Committees that visited ODL Institutions for DEC recognition.
The members noted that due to paucity of Staff of DEC the visit of ODL Institutions is being done at a slow pace. Therefore as soon as the Joint Committee gives approval to ODL Institutions and their programmes the matter can be placed on the DEC website without waiting for the notification by the Council. Whenever the next Council meeting is held the list of such institutions and their programmes could be put up for ratification.
Item No. 32.4: To consider and approve the guidelines for members of Expert Committees visiting ODL Institutions for DEC recognition.
The Council lauded the efforts of DEC for developing guidelines for members of Expert Committees visiting ODL Institutions for DEC recognition and the guidelines were approved
Item No. 32.5: To consider and approve the Policy Guidelines for Establishment of Centre for Internal Quality Assurance at ODL Institutions.
The DEC Policy for establishment of CIQA was approved by the Council. It was pointed out that it should be recorded as a pre accreditation venture of the DEC and the necessary change may be made in the document of CIQA. Also the payment norms suggested may be revised as per the latest UGC norms.
Item No. 32.6: To report the CVC inquiry report on VinayakaMissionsUniversity, Salem.
It was decided that the Chairman, DEC will constitute a Committee which will look into the CVC inquiry report on VinayakaMissionsUniversity, Salem and submit a report before the next Joint Committee Meeting. This committee will include members from DEC, AICTE and UGC.
Item No. 32.7: To report the Fact finding report on IASEUniversity, Sardarshahr, Rajasthan.
It was decided that the DEC will write to IASE University, Sardarshahr, Rajasthan to submit its comments to the show cause notice issued by the Government of India and a decision to visit the IASE University, Sardarshahr, Rajasthan based on its proposal to offer programs through Distance Education mode will be taken up after that based on the decision of the Government of India in the matter. Till such time IASEUniversity should not offer the programmes through Distance Education mode.
Item No. 32.8: To decide on the issue of Joint Signature in approval letters by Secretary, UGC, Member Secretary, AICTE and Director, DEC.
It was resolved that the Chairman, DEC Distance Education Council has the power to authorized the Director, DEC to sign all approval letters issued to ODL Institutions regarding their recognition by the Joint Committee of UGC, AICTE and DEC. In this regard the UGC-AICTE and DEC will jointly decide and change the provisions given in the MOU.
Item No. 32.9: To consider the issue of M. Phil/Ph.D through Distance Mode with reference to UGC notification dated 1st June, 2009 and to approve the guidelines for research through distance mode.
The DEC should prepare a draft of the guidelines for M. Phil & Ph. D programme offered by OUs for which a Committee may be constituted by the Chairman, DEC and the recommendations of the Committee along with draft guidelines be submitted to the UGC before 18th August, 2009.
Item No. 32.10: To review the composition of the Distance Education Council
The item was deferred in view of the proposed bill to make DEC an autonomous and independent regulatory body.
Item No. 32.11: Any other item with the permission of Chair.
(i) The members were informed of the recent letter issued by MHRD dt 29.07.2009 regarding withdrawal of permission given to Institutions to conduct B. Tech/B.E. Programmes through distance mode and also stop admissions to such programmes from the current year onwards. In this connection, it was noted that the Joint Committee of UGC-AICTE-DEC has not given recognition for any B.Tech/BE programme. The DEC has specifically insisted that any programme requiring approval from Statutory Councils like AICTE should be initiated, only after getting such recognitions. All members opined that implementation of the directive is rather difficult, since IGNOU itself is conducting B.Tech programmes. Instead it is to be ensured that the quality and rigour of the face-to-face component, practicals, project work etc in the delivery of such programmes needs to be followed by all ODL Institutions. Therefore a Committee may be constituted by the Chairman, DEC to examine the quality of B. Tech programmes offered through distance mode and to ascertain that they are at par with the conventional mode. Thereafter the report can be submitted to the MHRD to remove their assumption that practicals and project work are not being done in B. Tech programmes offered through distance mode.
(ii) Another issue was raised by one of the members, of the HaryanaState government not allowing IGNOU to open its study centres in any of its institutions. It was decided that IGNOU should once again approach the Haryana government and request them to mutually respect the provisions of the Open University instead of stopping it which is not a healthy practice.
The meeting ended with avote of thanks to the Chair.
(Prof. V. N. Rajasekharan Pillai)
Chairman