Voices against Delhi University's four-year undergraduate programme (FYUP) intensified today as various students' and teachers' bodies staged protests even as the admission process is going on in full swing.
While NSUI and ABVP demanded immediate rollback of FYUP, AISA and DUTA suggested an alternative paper scheme to enable students to graduate within three years.
National Students' Union of India (NSUI), seven of whose activists are on an indefinite fast since last Friday demanding an immediate rollback of FYUP, staged a rally outside the University campus and burnt effigies of HRD Minister Smriti Irani and DU Vice-Chancellor Dinesh Singh.
Staging demonstrations, All-India Students' Association (AISA) and Delhi University Teachers' Association (DUTA) suggested an alternative method to the programme.
"AISA and DUTA is planning to meet HRD Minister Smriti Irani soon over the issue and submit a memorandum proposing an alternative paper scheme which will enable the first batch of FYUP students to graduate in 3 years," president of AISA Sucheta De said.
Slamming NSUI's silence over the issue all this while, De said, "NSUI's hunger strike only exposes its double standards. It supported every move of the administration while the programme was being implemented. On the other hand ABVP kept DUSU ineffective in this regard as well."
NSUI, student wing of Congress, had remained neutral last year when the UPA government took the decision to implement the programme.
"We supported FYUP last year because it was being touted as a major reform towards improving the educational system. But in the last one year, we have realised that majority of the students are against FYUP and it is skewed against the students coming from the socio-economically weaker sections of the society for whom studying in Delhi for four years is a difficult proposition," NSUI spokesperson Amrish Pandey said.
