Mumbai: Mumbai University has authorized its PhD guides to conduct entrance test for those students already have registered themselves under them. As per sources, the University has made this special arrangement for nearly 600 students who registered for their doctoral studies when the university was dragging its feet over the mandatory regulations of the University Grants Commission.
In June 2009, University Grants Commission (UGC) has issued new rules for all universities across nation that they followed for registering research fellows. The first step involved was to conduct entrance test for the selection of candidates. The idea behind this step is to improve the quality of PhD research in India. But, the University recently has finalized its process for candidate’s selection and conducted an entrance test for those who registered themselves after February.
In the overruling period, the University has registered near by 600 PhD fellows on the basis of the old guidelines, who did not appear in any entrance test. Board of College and University Development (BCUD) diector Rajpal Hande said now, the academic council has decided that not only will the respective guides take the exam, but even the six-month classroom course on research methodology will be conducted by the respective guides. He added that this is a special decision.
This decision has brought smile to the face of many faces candidates as they had already completed a lot of groundwork in their research topic. Some of the prominent names in the list are: higher and technical education minister Rajesh Tope has registered under the university's commerce head Vivek Deolankar for his research in management, same as NCP MLA Jitendra Awhad registered in July 2009 for doctoral work in history and Shiv Sena's Anil Parab, who enrolled in December 2009.
Higher and Technical Education Minister Rajesh Tope, while sharing his views on the university's decision on allowing the guides to conduct the test, said that the academic council is responsible for making all university related decisions in the best interest of students. He also added that the university might have decided some means to retain the quality of the test for the candidates.
Furthermore, another registered candidate, Deepanshu Pusalkar, said that the decision came as a relief to most registered candidates. In addition, he said that as they have completed 70% of their PhD work, it would not have been fair for us to attempt a test at this juncture. There will not be any fear if our guides would conduct the test.
