These three universities belonging to Tamil Nadu have been granted category 1 status by UGC
Posted on: 14/Feb/2018 10:01:18 AM
The news that three universities from the state of Tamil Nadu been granted Category 1 status by the University Grants Commission or UGC has been the subject of discussion for many now.
These three universities namely Karaikudi based Alagappa University, Chennai based Sri Ramachandra University and Thanjavur based SASTRA have grabbed the attention of many as they have been granted Category 1 status by this UGC and it is now clear that these 3 popular universities of TN have the power to start new departments, courses, schools plus centres, distance education programmes etc and for these approval of the regulators is not a must.
The above news was confirmed on Monday 12th February 2018 by a notification from Union ministry for human resource development. It is important to note that the state of Maharashtra leads the list and as many as 10 universities in this state has been listed in Category 1.
The important piece of information is as many as 32 universities have now included under Category 1 and this is according to UGC Grant of Graded Autonomy regulation 2018 dated 12th February.
Students and staffs of the 3 universities of Alagappa University, Sri Ramachandra University and SASTRA must feel happy and proud regarding this.
A university would be classified under Category 1 when it satisfies few important parameters. These parameters includes having NAAC score above 3.5, any reputed agency enlisted by UGC has given corresponding accreditation grade. Another parameter is Times Higher Education or QS ranking the colleges in top 500.
Mr. S. Vaidhyasubramaniam, Dean of SHASTRA Tanjavur, shared his thoughts and said the academic autonomy to deserving higher educational institutions would be provided by the top status and these perks would not be ignored by the state governments.
Grades and rankings issues by the national organizations are considered seriously by the state and this was confirmed by none other than Mr. Sunil Paliwal who is the secretary for state higher education.
It must be noted that popular universities such as University of Madras and Anna University come under Category 2 and these universities have got NAAC score between 3.26 and 3.50. One important piece of information is popular educational institution SRM University also missed being under Category 1 by just 0.01 points.
It is worthy to note that these above said universities would have the power to start new courses and programmes just like those universities under Category 1. The point here is they would be limited to two off-campus facilities every 5 years.
