Govt mulls ombudsman in higher educational institutions

Updated on: Tuesday, January 17, 2012

In good news for students, the government has decided to have a grievance redressal mechanism in higher educational institutions.

The mechanism, which is likely to come into effect from the coming academic session, will require every institute to constitute an ombudsman, said HRD Minister Kapil Sibal, adding it will be implemented through an executive order.

Students of both management and technical institutes, central and deemed-to-be universities will benefit from it apart from teachers of education institutions under National Council of Teachers Education.

The ombudsman shall deliver order within one month. Though the order would not be binding on the institution, the regulator would rely on the frequency of non-observance of the order to decide on continued recognition to such institutions, said a statement of the ministry.

"The Parliamentary Standing Committee, while examining the Bill to prohibit and punish unfair practices, had recommended to constitute the grievance redressal mechanisms in higher education institution," Sibal told.

The ombudsman will handle all student related grievances except the service related issues concerning the teachers.

The ombudsman shall have the jurisdiction to hear grievances concerning denial of admission, non-observance of declared merit in admission and non-observance of applicable regulations for reservation.

Issues concerning withholding documents and non refund of fees in case of withdrawal of admission, discrimination and other such matters about students in pursuit of studies in the institution will also be handled by him, Sibal said.

The move comes as the HRD Ministry's much-vaunted Educational Tribunal passed is pending in Parliament for over a year now, diminishing hopes of lakhs of students looking for prompt redressal to their grievances.

The ombudsman will also act in filtering matters before they are taken up in the proposed education tribunals, sources in the HRD Ministry said.

According to Sibal, person with judicial or legal experience to be appointed as ombudsman from a panel suggested by the affiliating university for technical and management institutions, by the Central government for deemed universities and by the regulator for non-degree granting institutions.

Stressing on quality of teaching, Sibal said he will write to chief ministers to ensure attendance of teachers in classes, enhanced teacher training programme and curriculum reforms.

He said wherever state governments have given priority to education, the sector is doing well, adding the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) report released is reflective of the fact that quality is missing from the education sector.

The report, among other, says student in class V have difficulties reading class 2 books and in solving simple mathematics.

He said teachers are still not well conversant with continuous and comprehensive programmes in schools.

Referring to the report which reflected the growing inclination of students to enrol in private schools in rural areas, he said it also brought out the fact that parents are willing to educate students and that is one positive impact that the sector is witnessing.

About the establishment of the proposed National Council for Higher Education and Research, a bill pertaining to which has been tabled in Parliament, he said the step is significant in nature and comes after the ministry had several rounds of discussion in this regard.

However, he apparently criticised at the Bar council who did not attended none of the meetings protesting bringing legal education under the ambit of the proposed overarching body.

Lawyers across the country are likely to boycott courts on January 20 to protest against the move.

Govt mulls ombudsman in higher educational institutions

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