High Court asks UGC to respond to KSOU's plea

Bengaluru: The High Court of Karnataka on Tuesday asked the University Grants Commission (UGC) to file its response by October 31 on a petition filed by Karnataka State Open University (KSOU) seeking permission for its in-house programmes for 2017-18.

Justice G. Narendar, who heard KSOU’s petition, asked the UGC to file its statements while adjourning further hearing till November 2.The KSOU’s petition has claimed that UGC has not acted upon its request made eight months ago for grant of recognition to offer courses through in-house admission method for the academic year 2017-18.

It has also claimed that UGC should have considered the plea with a reasonable period.There was no difficulty for the UGC to grant permission for direct or in-house system as all the allegations of illegalities and irregularities levelled against the KSOU were related to admissions through Academic Collaborative System (ACS) with private institutions, and certainly no violations were found by the UGC in the in-house or direct admission system, the KSOU claimed in the petition.

Pointing out that no admissions were made during the academic years 2015-16 and 2016-17, and also for the year 2017-18 so far, the petition said that university’s infrastructures are now being wasted for the last two academic years because of the UGC.The KSOU also termed as illegal the public notice issued by the UGC in June 2015 discontinuing recognition to KSOU from the academic year 2013-14 as the UGC had taken the decision of discontinuing the recognition only in its meeting held in February 2016.