The JNU Students Union members on Thursday urged HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar to intervene and help roll back a change in the admission procedure for the M.Phil and Ph.D candidates.
The JNUSU members met Javdekar and presented him a memorandum apprising him of "threats that the change in admission procedure would entail if implemented".
"The UGC notification will undermine JNU's unique and decades-old deprivation point system in admissions, and the Prof. Nafey Committee Recommendations (obtained after years of felt need and struggle) to reduce viva weightage in M.Phil. and Ph.D admissions," the letter read.
The notification in contention was adopted by the Jawaharlal Nehru University's Academic Council amid protests by many of its members and students on December 26 last year. It was issued by the University Grants Commission (UGC) on May 5 last year.
According to it, the entrance test is to act as a qualifying exam and selected students are to be admitted solely on the basis of interview.
"The fact that the UGC notification mentions that the written (test) will be qualifying is being interpreted by the JNU Vice Chancellor to mean that the written will be a mere qualifier and that final selection will be based only on viva, raising viva weightage in admissions to 100 per cent," the letter added.
A total of 11 JNU students, who included the JNUSU President Mohit Pandey and other members of the union, also began their hunger-strike on Thursday as a way of protest.
--IANS
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