SOCIAL STUDY AT VARSITIES IN UGC FEAR

The reported decision of the University Grants Commission (UGC) to stop funding the Centre for Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi, has raised questions over the future of related departments in four universities in the two Telugu states.

In all, 35 universities nationwide get UGC grants for social exclusion studies including the University of Hyderabad (UoH), English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU), Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU) in Hyderabad and Andhra University in AP.

The UGC, in its letter to the JNU, has stated that it will not provide financial support to the centre after the 12th Plan period ends on March 31.

At the UoH, the Centre for Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy has been functioning from 2007. The department has four faculty members and 50 students pursuing their MPhil and PhD.

According to UoH officials, there was no clarity on whether the UGC had decided to stop funding the centre at only JNU or in universities across the country.

Retired UoH professor and Social activist Prof. G. Haragopal, a former UoH faculty, alleged that the BJP government at the Centre was trying to close down studies on social exclusion, women and human rights. The Union ministry for human resource development “has taken an ideological stand and is taking steps to kill these centres,” he said.