Chapter on Pune businessman DS Kulkarni removed

PUNE: Following the controversy surrounding the Bcom syllabus, which had a chapter on Pune real estate businessman Deepak Sakharam Kulkarni (DSK), the Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU) on Monday, decided to withdraw it on Monday.

Founder of the DSK Group, Kulkarni’s mention in the book was objected to by some organisations including the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), after he was arrested by the Pune police in an ongoing multi-crore fraud case.

Earlier in the month of July, NCP leader Hemant Prabhakar Takle, had requested the university authorities to eliminate the chapter on DSK from the first and third year Bcom course.

While speaking on the sidelines of the assembly session, the NCP leader Takle had posed the question whether students should really take lessons from the life of a person who is entangled in the violation of law and order.

Considering this, the Savitribai Phule Pune University in an official circular, announced that the book for first year Bcom, ‘Yashogatha’ (Success Stories) will not include an article on living personalities in business industry by PC Shejwalkar.

The article has been removed from the syllabus for the 2018-19 academic year, said the notification.

Similarly, the syllabus for the third year Bcom, included a a special section on Unit 3, the study of autobiographies, in the paper Business Entrepreneurship Special Paper III, under the Business Entrepreneurship course code-306 g.

This section mentioned the journey of DSK to success, and now has been removed from the entire syllabus.

In February, DSK and his wife Hemanti Kulkarni were arrested for economic fraud.