Top colleges all set to become universities

Even while the Supreme Court is seized of the deemed universities status granted to many institutions during the UPA- I government, the University Grants Commission is toying with an idea of giving the university status to reputed colleges in India to let them give own degrees.

The move is to promote the university- level research that has almost become defunct as some 400 universities in existence are not able to do anything more than affiliating the colleges and conducting of examinations.

The UGC has sent to the Human Resources Development Ministry a list of 500 colleges that can be declared autonomous universities right away on the basis of the faculty and basic infrastructure.

It hopes that the university status to the colleges will start a competition among them for imparting quality education to get recognition to their degrees and promote them to become centres of research.

There are some 31,000 colleges on the UGC list and hence only 500 of them passing the muster itself puts a question mark on the mushroom growth of colleges and their recognition by the commission. Its sources said all these colleges will be put on notice to come up to the UGC standards within three years or else they will be disaffiliated from universities and converted into vocational training institutes.