IMPHAL, January 28: All Tribal Students Union, Manipur has demanded that MPSC must follow UGC norms while recruiting assistant professors for government colleges.
Speaking to the media at a press meet in the ATSUM office at Nagaram, Vareiyo Shatsang, general secretary of the apex tribal students`™ body, said multi-disciplinary subjects must be recognised by MPSC as per UGC norms without any discrimination.
As per UGC norms, equal weightage should be given to publication of seminar papers, teaching experience etc, and the academic track record, he added, warning to launch agitations from February first week if the government doesn`™t comply to the norms laid down by UGC.
He said it was unfortunate that MPSC was sticking to a norm that`™s being followed in the recruitment of teachers under RMSA, SSA etc where 85 percent weightage is given to academic performance with the remaining 15 percent decided by how one performs in an interview, which is not justified while selecting teachers for the highest seat of learning.
Elaborating that all levels of studies beginning from matriculation to post graduation is not equally important, he said that`™s why more weightage should be given to the graduation and the post graduation level. The current norms of MPSC are ridiculous and irrational as it gives more weightage to performances at the matriculation and intermediation exams more than Ph. D degrees.
The National Eligibility Test (NET) conducted by UGC, CSIR or similar test recognised by the UGC like SLET/SET is a required qualification for the post of assistant professor in colleges and universities, he said, adding MPSC shouldn`t overlook the importance of NET/SLET/JRF during the recruitment.
As such NET/SLET/JRF should be given equal weightage to Ph. D degrees while considering all the criteria and publication of research works, seminar papers and teaching experience etc should be given more weightage than performance at the intermediate levels, he said.
He further said that Mphil/PhD degree holders from relevant multidisciplinary centres/subjects must also be considered as per UGC norms during the recruitment without any bias and discrimination. It is unfair on the part of MPSC to evaluate only the academic performance indicators and the performance in a Viva Voce for the recruitment of assistant professors, he added.
All PhD holders before or after 2009 must be treated equally but while also keeping this in mind that the marking system during the late 80`s, and the 90`s varies a lot. There has been a more liberal system of marking from 2005 onwards, Shatsang said.