Speaker 1: Today on the show, our focus is on the state
Speaker 1: of education in India. We look at the demolition threat
Speaker 1: hanging over Muhammad Ali Jahord University in Rampur and why
Speaker 1: students say it puts their education and future at risk.
Speaker 1: We also turned to Utra Khand where two university examinations
Speaker 1: have been canceled. But first we talk about a major
Speaker 1: reason why India's education system is failing the youth of
Speaker 1: the country. Hi, I'm Atchasharma and you're listening to three
Speaker 1: things the Indian Express New Show. For over a month now,
Speaker 1: protesters from across the country have gathered under the banner
Speaker 1: of the Cokro Junta party demanding the resignation of Education
Speaker 1: Minister Thramindri Pradhan. The trigger, as most of you may remember,
Speaker 1: was a leaked neat Yuji question paper. And this problem,
Speaker 1: of course, is not new. Over the past debas, more
Speaker 1: than one hundred and fifty competitive exams in India have
Speaker 1: seen leaks, and an Indian Express investigation found that are
Speaker 1: forty five major leak cases over two decades, only two
Speaker 1: ended in conviction. In fact, two accused in one of
Speaker 1: those cases are now sitting MLAs in Uttar Pradesh. Now
Speaker 1: When it comes to the problems concerning India's education, one
Speaker 1: issue that stands out is funding, especially how much of
Speaker 1: the Union budget actually goes to education. So in this
Speaker 1: segment we'll be discussing what this means for the protests
Speaker 1: and what it says about the government's priority is going forward.
Speaker 1: And for this we are joined by the Indian Expresses
Speaker 1: Udit Misha, who reported on this data for the paper
Speaker 1: other than your latest piece. You compare education's share of
Speaker 1: the Union budget rather than the absolute amount allocated to it,
Speaker 1: So can you tell us why is that distinction so important?
Speaker 2: So my purpose was to look at the share, because
Speaker 2: it tells you the priority is where is the stress
Speaker 2: that the government is putting. Does it want to put
Speaker 2: more emphasis on education or does it want to promote
Speaker 2: more roads, more health? What is it trying to do?
Speaker 2: That is why we are looking at the share, because
Speaker 2: share is out of the same hundred percent, right, the
Speaker 2: same regardless of how much nominally you spend, it's the
Speaker 2: same one hundred percent out of which you are trying
Speaker 2: to figure out what is the share of a particular department,
Speaker 2: And that over time tells you whether the government is
Speaker 2: emphasizing that expenditure on that particular.
Speaker 3: Department or de emphasizing it.
Speaker 2: And that is where I've looked at data for education, health,
Speaker 2: and roads and highways, just to illustrate the broader trend.
Speaker 1: Right, and you've looked at longitudinal data that is over
Speaker 1: the past decade. So what does the data actually tell us?
Speaker 1: How has education's share of the budget changed?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, I mean we have found that typically a
Speaker 2: criticism of Indian budgets has been that Indian governments have
Speaker 2: not spent as much of the budget on.
Speaker 3: Education and health.
Speaker 2: You know, Academics have often said that we should be
Speaker 2: spending you know, a much larger amount of the total
Speaker 2: budget on health and education because we are a large
Speaker 2: population and we are a developing country and we need
Speaker 2: to invest in our people. Now, what the data is
Speaker 2: showing is that over the last twelve years, say, the
Speaker 2: share of education department in the total budget has fallen
Speaker 2: from four point six percent, which is to say that
Speaker 2: out of every one hundred rupees that a government spent
Speaker 2: twelve years ago four rupees sixty per hours spent towards education,
Speaker 2: that amount has fallen to two point five percent, which
Speaker 2: is to say, of every one hundred rupees that a
Speaker 2: government spends today, only two point two rupees fifty p
Speaker 2: s I is.
Speaker 3: Spent towards education.
Speaker 2: So what we find is that the emphasis on education
Speaker 2: over every one hundred rupees that the government spends has
Speaker 2: come down. And for health, we find that this number
Speaker 2: is largely stagnant. It has remained at around two rupees
Speaker 2: for a three hundred rupeces that the government spends for
Speaker 2: roads and highways, which is a very stark case, it
Speaker 2: has gone up from less than two rupees or two
Speaker 2: percent one point eight percent roughly to five point eight
Speaker 2: percent now in twelve years, which is to say that
Speaker 2: it has troubled. So the government spending three times more
Speaker 2: relatively on making roads and highways. And now this tallies
Speaker 2: very well with the notion or the understanding that this
Speaker 2: government has had where it has tried to focus on
Speaker 2: physical infrastructure, that creating more physical infrastructure, which is also
Speaker 2: needed in India, will create jobs, which it will also
Speaker 2: boost the productive capacity. More roads means more commerce can
Speaker 2: happen and can happen at a cheaper price. But it
Speaker 2: seems like the increased expenditure on roads and highways seems
Speaker 2: to have come at the cost of things like education
Speaker 2: and health, health staying stagnant in terms of the share,
Speaker 2: and education actually getting reduced well almost half in terms.
Speaker 3: Of the share that it had in the overall expenditure.
Speaker 1: Okay, so education share of the budget has fallen, But
Speaker 1: on ground, why should a student care? What does that
Speaker 1: actually mean for them?
Speaker 2: So, you know, often enough you would have heard that
Speaker 2: governments often say that they don't have enough money to
Speaker 2: perhaps provide certain services, like in India, many citizens would
Speaker 2: say that we don't have better health care better say
Speaker 2: public transport, or public housing or education. And the source
Speaker 2: of all of that is that governments don't have the
Speaker 2: money now in any developing economy, especially with the you know,
Speaker 2: when we are living in a neighborhood where we are
Speaker 2: also having defense issues with our neighbors, there are all
Speaker 2: kinds of competing demands for the government. You know, it
Speaker 2: has to figure out how much to spend on say defense,
Speaker 2: and how much to spend on education versus how much
Speaker 2: to spend on healthcare. But money is very central to
Speaker 2: whether the governments can provide any service or not. Can
Speaker 2: you have good public health care system where government can
Speaker 2: provide you cheap, reliable health care. It will depend essentially
Speaker 2: on the money that it allocates. If that money is
Speaker 2: getting reduced in relative terms and more is being spent
Speaker 2: on other things, then citizens cannot really expect that they
Speaker 2: would get better health care or better education. Public education
Speaker 2: will get undermined, and this will reflect in things like
Speaker 2: fewer schools, fewer teachers or less motivated teachers, fewer libraries
Speaker 2: or less well stocked libraries.
Speaker 3: So this is the.
Speaker 2: Reason why readers or listeners should care of how much
Speaker 2: money is being spent on education or health.
Speaker 1: I know that the example you gave if roads have
Speaker 1: received a much larger share of the budget, is that
Speaker 1: necessarily a bad thing, because the government could argue that
Speaker 1: infrastructure ultimately creates jobs and generates the resources needed to
Speaker 1: invest in education later.
Speaker 2: So there is no one way to understand this, but
Speaker 2: it is important to note that, first of all, whether
Speaker 2: you spend more on roads or on education does have
Speaker 2: an impact on the number of schools you make and
Speaker 2: the salaries you pay, or the facilities you provide, or
Speaker 2: the curriculum, all kinds of investments that come specific to education.
Speaker 3: The other thing is that you can go up round
Speaker 3: about and.
Speaker 2: Say that more roads will create more jobs but creating
Speaker 2: more jobs might require more skilled people. If you do
Speaker 2: not have well educated skilled people, there is a chance
Speaker 2: that the person making the road may actually employ a machine. Right,
Speaker 2: So just spending more money to make more roads may
Speaker 2: not necessarily have a straightaway.
Speaker 3: Impact the way you imagine.
Speaker 2: It is also important that you can make a highway
Speaker 2: and you can make a rural road. And you may
Speaker 2: find that highways can be made through highly mechanized ways.
Speaker 2: You know, big machines can make highways, whereas maybe smaller
Speaker 2: rural roads might require more human labor. So even for
Speaker 2: creation of job, you know, you could choose to spend
Speaker 2: money in a way which creates more roads but less
Speaker 2: job or more jobs and you know, smaller roads. So
Speaker 2: this holy issue gets more nuanced. But broadly speaking, spending
Speaker 2: less on education for a country like India, which is
Speaker 2: the most populous country on the planet, as well as
Speaker 2: one which is one of the youngest and which has
Speaker 2: a population that needs education and high quality education to
Speaker 2: be part of a economy which is, you know, buffeted
Speaker 2: by technological change, we need to empower our citizens and
Speaker 2: young people to be part of that story, of that
Speaker 2: growth story. If we do not spend that money. There
Speaker 2: is a very good chance that those who are making
Speaker 2: roads or other goods in the economy may choose more
Speaker 2: capital solutions, more machines than human beings, and that will
Speaker 2: create a problem for us.
Speaker 1: But also does spending more money automatically lead to a
Speaker 1: better education system.
Speaker 2: So on the whole one could say that, yes, spending
Speaker 2: more would help matters. It's maybe necessary, but not a
Speaker 2: sufficient condition. Let me put it that way. As we've
Speaker 2: seen in many instances where roads have sunk, new roads
Speaker 2: that were built have sunk, new highways have sunk, or
Speaker 2: bridges have collapsed. You can spend a lot of money,
Speaker 2: but if you've not taken care of how you make it,
Speaker 2: the quality, and if there is corruption behind it, those
Speaker 2: things may not actually survive. And you may have spent
Speaker 2: a lot of money and still not end up with
Speaker 2: a all whether road or a good quality road. It's
Speaker 2: the same for education also, if your curriculum is not good,
Speaker 2: if you have not put other things in order, Like say,
Speaker 2: you may spend a lot of money making schools, but
Speaker 2: you may not be spending enough money on curriculum or
Speaker 2: giving fee to the salaries for your teachers if they
Speaker 2: are not motivated. If the conditions are not good, then
Speaker 2: that can create suboptimal outcomes. So, as I said, spending
Speaker 2: more money is the first stop. There is no necessary
Speaker 2: guarantee that it would necessarily mean better outcomes, but more
Speaker 2: often than not, it typically aligns with better outcomes, just
Speaker 2: like having a higher GDP or a higher GDP growth
Speaker 2: is overall more aligned with more prosperity in the country.
Speaker 1: I know that the unders we're seeing now addressing the
Speaker 1: repeated exam leaks or shortage of faculty, can those be
Speaker 1: linked to lower public investment too? Or are those separate
Speaker 1: issues altogether?
Speaker 2: At the heart of the whole point with money is
Speaker 2: that you know, can you get better outcomes by using money?
Speaker 2: Can you attract the best talent right at all stages?
Speaker 2: Can you have the best equipment? Can you really fund
Speaker 2: your agencies because ultimately somebody or the other is going
Speaker 2: to do that work, so can you get the best
Speaker 2: people for the job. While government spends, they have to
Speaker 2: compete in a marketplace where private sector is also there.
Speaker 2: So it's also about attracting best talent. So it might
Speaker 2: be very difficult to conclusively say whether more money necessarily
Speaker 2: helps or doesn't, But more money is necessary for all
Speaker 2: the other things to fall in line. If you are
Speaker 2: not going to spend as much and progressively as the
Speaker 2: data is showing, starve a department like education or funds
Speaker 2: not spend as much. Like your total budget might be
Speaker 2: going up by ten percent and year on year and
Speaker 2: education might be going up only by five percent. You
Speaker 2: are effectively dragging your feet on that issue and it
Speaker 2: will create problems, It will hold back from improvements. So
Speaker 2: that is the point to be made right now.
Speaker 1: Another thing that you highlighted earlier was that the governments
Speaker 1: often argue that the focus today is shifting from education
Speaker 1: to skills. So does the budget data support that claim?
Speaker 2: Yes, So, I mean it's fairly sobering the data. I've
Speaker 2: put it in the piece. Also, if you look at
Speaker 2: the Ministry of Skill Development, which was carved out as
Speaker 2: a separate ministry in twenty fifteen sixteen because of a
Speaker 2: very well recognized need that our education is different from
Speaker 2: the skilling needs that we have and often there is
Speaker 2: too much emphasis on higher education and then producing some
Speaker 2: class of people who are perhaps not as employable in
Speaker 2: the private sector, so because they lack the skills. So
Speaker 2: a new department was made a Ministry of Skill Development.
Speaker 2: But if you look at the budget allocation to Ministry
Speaker 2: of Skill Development as again as a percentage of the
Speaker 2: total allocation, those numbers are abissimally low. It started off
Speaker 2: with something like zero point zero five or six percent
Speaker 2: of the total budget, which is to say that up
Speaker 2: to a first decimal digit it is zero and it
Speaker 2: has largely stayed in that range. Even in the last
Speaker 2: and which ended in March, the total expenditure as a
Speaker 2: share of on total expenditure on skill development as a
Speaker 2: percentage of the total.
Speaker 3: Budget was zero point zero five.
Speaker 2: So it is abessimally low if we really are serious
Speaker 2: about skilling India's youth and making them capable and employable
Speaker 2: and part of a India growth story.
Speaker 3: So then data is fairly.
Speaker 2: Damning that you know, it is not actually aligned with
Speaker 2: the aspirations that people might have or the overall recognition
Speaker 2: that everybody has that India has to empower, educate and
Speaker 2: scale its people for the growth to really give good results.
Speaker 2: It's no point growing at seven or eight percent if
Speaker 2: your economy is not creating good quality jobs and people
Speaker 2: are not able to take part in it.
Speaker 1: I know that we often see debates about how countries
Speaker 1: like Finland or close of home China have transformed themselves
Speaker 1: through education. So how does India's public space compare internationally
Speaker 1: and also how does this budget debate fit into the
Speaker 1: broader landscape of the ongoing protests.
Speaker 2: So while the current protests happening in jun Monther might
Speaker 2: have been triggered by the leaks in the NEAT exams
Speaker 2: and other examinations, there is now a greater call for
Speaker 2: overhauling India's education and taking a closer.
Speaker 3: Look at it.
Speaker 2: And it is true that India never spent as much
Speaker 2: as it was supposed to on education. Academics across over
Speaker 2: time have said that, you know, India should be spending more.
Speaker 2: Even the education policies that have come out over time
Speaker 2: have demanded higher shares of public spending on education. And
Speaker 2: as we've shown in this data, instead of going up,
Speaker 2: it has actually come down in very significant ways. The
Speaker 2: important thing to understand is that we can compare India's
Speaker 2: numbers internationally, but it is important to understand that India
Speaker 2: is not exactly comparable with every international country. For example,
Speaker 2: if you were to look at say Japan or a
Speaker 2: Germany and compare it with India. Those are economies of
Speaker 2: comparable GDP, you know, overall economic output, but might have
Speaker 2: much I mean, they have much smaller populations, fewer kids
Speaker 2: to educate, and might have a very different structure of
Speaker 2: their economy. So how we spend our money and how
Speaker 2: much we spend has to be determined by the number
Speaker 2: of people we have and what are we trying to
Speaker 2: educate them for. You know, what are we trying to
Speaker 2: skill them for? So it has to be a more
Speaker 2: holistic approach instead of just looking at just an amount
Speaker 2: of money. While it should be clear that we should
Speaker 2: be increasing our public spending on education, there should not
Speaker 2: be a one to one correlation between what other countries
Speaker 2: are doing because we are in a different stage of
Speaker 2: our development. We have far more kids in our economy,
Speaker 2: much younger population, much larger, younger popular and also the
Speaker 2: shape and structure of our economy. What are we trying
Speaker 2: to skill them for. So all those things have to
Speaker 2: be kept in mind when you're deciding something like this.
Speaker 1: And next we turn to a story from Uttar Pradesh
Speaker 1: where the future of thousands of students hangs in the balance.
Speaker 1: Students of the Muhammad Ali Jahor University in Rampur have
Speaker 1: been staging an indefinite sit in protest outside the campus
Speaker 1: after the Ramput Development Authority ordered the demolition of thirty
Speaker 1: eight university buildings. The students say the move puts not
Speaker 1: just their education but also their future and careers at
Speaker 1: risk and are demanding that the order be withdrawn. The
Speaker 1: demolition order has also drawn criticism because it is the
Speaker 1: only university in the Muslim majority district of Rampur. To
Speaker 1: understand what led to this demolition order and what it
Speaker 1: means for the students, my colleague Aharakan Nanda speaks to
Speaker 1: the Indian Expresses, Malchi said, who has been reporting on
Speaker 1: this for.
Speaker 4: The paper malt, can you first tell us a bit
Speaker 4: about the Mohammad Ali Johori University. What kind of significance
Speaker 4: does it hold for the people of the region.
Speaker 5: See, this university was basically established by an act in
Speaker 5: two thousand and five. It was during Mulayan Singh led
Speaker 5: Samajuwadhi Party gument Nuta Padesha at that point of time,
Speaker 5: but before the university could actually start establishing or creating infrastructure.
Speaker 5: In two thousand and seven, again the elections were their
Speaker 5: NBSP government came to par so this university kind of
Speaker 5: went into the back burner. But the establishment of the
Speaker 5: campus and everything is started when in twenty twelve Samajwadi
Speaker 5: Party government again came to par and A Clasia became
Speaker 5: the Chief Minister, so the rest of the developments and
Speaker 5: everything is started. At that point of time, the university
Speaker 5: becomes significant because in Rampur per Se, which is a
Speaker 5: minor de dominated region, there's no other university beat private
Speaker 5: or the government. Recently, in Muradabad one university has been opened,
Speaker 5: but last year its campus is still under construction. So
Speaker 5: at that point of time and up till recently, there's
Speaker 5: no other university in Rampur as such. And even though
Speaker 5: this was a private university, but as the students say
Speaker 5: that they used to get a lot of consitions in
Speaker 5: admissions in this particular university, and especially they mentioned that
Speaker 5: it was significant for the girls student because usually the
Speaker 5: parents of the neighboring areas would not allow the girls
Speaker 5: to go too far off districts just to study. So
Speaker 5: even though they are colleges within Rampur who are affiliated
Speaker 5: to other universities, because there's no other university within the
Speaker 5: district as such, yeah, and tell.
Speaker 4: Us about the order. What did the rdsay regarding the demolition?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 5: See on June twenty eight. Recently, the Rampu Development Authority
Speaker 5: had given notice to the university to explain why they
Speaker 5: do not have the maps approved for thirty eight out
Speaker 5: of forty building of theirs. So these are different buildings.
Speaker 5: These include hostels, faculty blocks of the Islamic Studies, law study,
Speaker 5: law faculty, science, paramedics, different faculty blocks that are there,
Speaker 5: including a museum as well as a library. So the
Speaker 5: plea that the Rampu Development Authority had given while issuing
Speaker 5: the notice was that the university had taken approval for
Speaker 5: two maps out of forty buildings that were found on spot,
Speaker 5: but for rest thirty eight they could not find any
Speaker 5: map approval. So RID had given notice to the university
Speaker 5: for that, and then they had called the university representatives
Speaker 5: as well as the representatives of the trust which had
Speaker 5: formed the university. So in the plea, the trust officials
Speaker 5: had said that when the university was formed and when
Speaker 5: the construction of these buildings, because the officials say that
Speaker 5: most of these buildings were constructed before twenty sixteen. So
Speaker 5: the trust made a plea that when it was done,
Speaker 5: the construction was mostly last the major construction took place
Speaker 5: at that point of time. The RDA was not into
Speaker 5: what idea was into existence. Was this particular region did
Speaker 5: not come under the jurisdiction of RDA, so RDA has
Speaker 5: no authority to ask for a map. So RDA had
Speaker 5: called the university authorities again for a one to one
Speaker 5: meeting and they were given a chance for a personal hearing.
Speaker 5: But the pleas of the university were not found satisfactory,
Speaker 5: as the DA said, because they had taken at that
Speaker 5: point of time even before because urd this particular ada
Speaker 5: came into the jurisdiction of RDA in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 5: Even before that, the two buildings had taken permission from
Speaker 5: the Jilla Panchayad, which was the authority at that point
Speaker 5: of time, so they could have taken it for the
Speaker 5: rest of the buildings also from the same authority, which
Speaker 5: they did not. So, not finding the plea of the
Speaker 5: trust of satisfactory, the RDA finally decided to issue a
Speaker 5: demolition order, which was passed on July fifteenth, and they
Speaker 5: were given a twenty days time to respond. We actually
Speaker 5: asked to either demolish these buildings on their own or
Speaker 5: RDA would do it. And in case rd would do it,
Speaker 5: the university would have to be at the cost of
Speaker 5: the entire demolition.
Speaker 4: Right, and now we understand that the students of the
Speaker 4: university are sitting in protest against disorder, So tell us
Speaker 4: what are their demands.
Speaker 5: Yes, about three days after the notice, students sat on
Speaker 5: protest outside the gate's main gate of the university and
Speaker 5: they have been sitting on protests since then. These students
Speaker 5: have made differently the major really that the students are
Speaker 5: giving by demolished because these are huge infrastructure. They're saying,
Speaker 5: in case university did not follow the norms or something
Speaker 5: was lacking, it could be made to do so, it
Speaker 5: could be imposed. Fine, if some name has to be changed,
Speaker 5: it could be changed. But the major question remains why demolished.
Speaker 5: So that has been the major demand of the students
Speaker 5: that the university premises should not be demolished, because thirty
Speaker 5: ered buildings would mean that most of the university campus
Speaker 5: would be demolished, because the two remaining buildings remained to
Speaker 5: be one edmin and the other one being just the
Speaker 5: medical college. So rest all the faculty buildings, everything would
Speaker 5: be demolished. So the students are requesting that the demolition
Speaker 5: should not take place and if required, the required changes
Speaker 5: of fine could be imposed and or some have even
Speaker 5: requested that government could take over the university. But they
Speaker 5: have been making a request that it should not be demolished.
Speaker 4: Right and what kind of political reactions has this situation garnered?
Speaker 4: What has this Maajwadi party said about it?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I see, initially there was not much of a
Speaker 5: response and even after the demolition noticed even the family
Speaker 5: members of the Splidasamka was the founder of the university,
Speaker 5: they were kind of looking into the legal option and everything.
Speaker 5: So it's only after three or four days major reactions
Speaker 5: started coming in. Just this Thursday, SPED delegation went to
Speaker 5: Rampurt to give a memorandum to the district magistrate and
Speaker 5: they have demanded that the university should not be demolished.
Speaker 5: They have challenged their order and the sp has been
Speaker 5: constantly calling it upical vendetta against Azam Khan as well
Speaker 5: as speed So Samaja. The party has largely been calling
Speaker 5: it a political vendetta and malshi.
Speaker 4: If these demolitions were to happen, what would it mean
Speaker 4: for the students, especially for the Muslim students who were
Speaker 4: studying at the university, and is there any immediate threat
Speaker 4: to the validity of their qualifications.
Speaker 5: See, there's no threat to the validity because the day
Speaker 5: the decision was taken, the district administration had put up
Speaker 5: a camp outside the university gates and the teachers of
Speaker 5: the different colleges government colleges in Rampur were put there
Speaker 5: as a counsellor's So they said that because most of
Speaker 5: the students came up with that kind of a query
Speaker 5: that the degrees that they had taken in the past,
Speaker 5: so would those be valid. So they continuously kept on
Speaker 5: saying that the decision would not affect those degrees and
Speaker 5: they kind of gave assurance to the students that for
Speaker 5: the future they'll be attached to the colleges. They were
Speaker 5: given about list of thirty colleges and they were told
Speaker 5: that they could choose any of these thirty colleges which
Speaker 5: are affiliated to the neighboring university, Jumbi Sure University which is
Speaker 5: in District Muradabad, So they could choose any one of those.
Speaker 5: These colleges are both government as well as the private colleges.
Speaker 5: So they have been given the option. And these teachers
Speaker 5: and the education officers said that because they have spoken
Speaker 5: to the university and the government has made arrangement and
Speaker 5: these students can actually go and enroll themselves in these colleges.
Speaker 5: But the students are saying that it's not easy because
Speaker 5: that would mean that they'll have to travel longer distance.
Speaker 5: And as I said that, the larger concern was among
Speaker 5: the girls student. They said that because this was right
Speaker 5: in the district and their parents allowed it and they're
Speaker 5: not sure whether they'll be allowed to go to far
Speaker 5: off colleges and especially in another district and even the colleges
Speaker 5: which are far off in Rampur. So that was the
Speaker 5: concern largely among the girls student. But the administration has
Speaker 5: constantly maintained that the validity of the degrees given in
Speaker 5: the past would not be affected as far.
Speaker 4: And has the university administration or authorities said anything about
Speaker 4: the situation yet.
Speaker 5: No, officially, they haven't responded as such, they haven't said
Speaker 5: anything officially to anybody as of arm and maulstream.
Speaker 4: Now what is the way forward for the university? What
Speaker 4: can we expect in the upcoming days?
Speaker 5: See the university still has an opportunity to make a
Speaker 5: plea and as I spoke to officials, they said that
Speaker 5: it has been issued by the vice chairman and they
Speaker 5: still have the opportunity to make an appeal with the
Speaker 5: chairman which is also the Divisional Commissioner Muradhabad or they
Speaker 5: could approach the court. So as I said that everybody
Speaker 5: is still looking into the legal options of the notices
Speaker 5: that have been served so far, They're still looking into it.
Speaker 1: And in the end we talk about yet another paper league.
Speaker 1: The Utra Khan Technical University has canceled two examinations after
Speaker 1: an external paper setter allegedly shared questions with students before
Speaker 1: one of the tests was conducted. As reported by the
Speaker 1: Indian expresses Eshwarieraj, the university received a complaint concerning the
Speaker 1: machine learning for Internet of Things examination. Inquiries conducted by
Speaker 1: both the university and the affiliated institution found that questions
Speaker 1: allegedly shared by the paper setter through an internal portal
Speaker 1: and a WhatsApp group were identical to those that later
Speaker 1: appeared in the examination. The matter affects students from twelve
Speaker 1: institutions affiliated with vir Madho Singh Bundari Utrakhan Technical University
Speaker 1: in Tehradun Now. The inquiry also raised concerns about another examination.
Speaker 1: Investigators found that the same faculty member had prepared the
Speaker 1: paper for electromagnetic field theory, which was also suspected to
Speaker 1: have been late. The university consequently canceled examinations in both
Speaker 1: subjects and said they would be conducted again in the
Speaker 1: third week of August. According to the director of Shwalik
Speaker 1: College of Engineering, the professor had allegedly circulated around fifty
Speaker 1: questions in a student's WhatsApp group. Those questions later appeared
Speaker 1: in the paper he had prepared. The complaint was received
Speaker 1: on eighth of July, following which the college constituted an
Speaker 1: inquiry committee. The committee submitted its findings on thirteenth of July,
Speaker 1: and the institution initially barred the faculty member from setting
Speaker 1: examination papers for three years. The university subsequently held him
Speaker 1: responsible for the alleged leak and debarred him from all
Speaker 1: examination related work for seven years. The college has also
Speaker 1: terminated his services, describing the alleged misconduct as a serious
Speaker 1: breach of trust and professional ethics. The university has separately
Speaker 1: worn the institution for failing to maintain adequate supervision and
Speaker 1: institutional control. This case comes against the backdrop of early
Speaker 1: examination controversiesin okrak Hunt. The state witness protests last year
Speaker 1: over an alleged leak involving a recruitment Examinationations that papers
Speaker 1: were sold to candidates in twenty twenty three pert Vardi,
Speaker 1: an accountant examination, had led to its cancelation. Those controversies
Speaker 1: had also prompted the state government to introduce legislation aimed
Speaker 1: at curbing cheating in public examinations. You were listening to
Speaker 1: Three Things by the Indian Express. Today's show was edited
Speaker 1: and mixed by Suraesh Pavar and produced by Niharikan Nanda
Speaker 1: and me Ichasharma. If you like the show, do subscribe
Speaker 1: to us wherever you get your podcast. You can also
Speaker 1: recommend it to someone you think may like it, with
Speaker 1: a friend or in your family. This is the best
Speaker 1: way for people to get to know about us. You
Speaker 1: can also tweet us at Express podcast or write to
Speaker 1: us at podcast at Indian Express dot com.