SFI To Organise Nationwide Protest Against Appointment Of JNU VC As UGC Chairman

The Central Executive Committee of the Students’ Federation of India is of the view that the recent appointment of the JNU Vice Chancellor to the post of Chairman of the University Grants Commission(UGC) is a step by the current RSS-BJP led Central Government to further the neo-liberal policies in higher education institutions across the country. SFI has called all its units to protest against the appointment of the JNU Vice Chancellor, Prof. Mamidala Jagdesh Kumar to the post of Chairman of UGC. SFI in their statement released on 05/02/2022 has stated that in the coming days, they will unitedly oppose any such policies which will be detrimental to the future of the student community across the country. Further they state that from the experience of past 6 years, Prof. Mamidala Jagdesh Kumar, the sitting Vice Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru University has been known for taking up decisions which are anti-student, teachers and staff. From dismantling democratic decision making process including the Academic Council to Executive Councils, to pushing agendas such as fee hike and Privatisation is well known. Not only limited to this, Jagadesh Kumar has been notoriously known for flouting appointment process, dismantling bodies like GSCASH. Under his tenure, JNU also saw the maximum number of seat cut in MPhil/PhD program, handing over JNU Entrance Examination to the National Testing Agency and altering the pattern of the progressive admission policy, JNU used to have. JNU also witnessed continuous violation of reservation policy in the admission process. The recent arbitrary decision of passing CUCET at JNU also shows his loyalty towards the ruling dispensation to further the agenda of NEP. The appointment of Prof. Mamidala Jagdesh Kumar to UGC, is nothing but the Government’s clear signal to all other higher education institutions across the country to replicate the arbitrary decisions taken in JNU, uniformly to other educational institutions to satisfy the agenda of commercialisation, communalisation and saffronisation.