This Article is From Jun 15, 2012

Autonomy of IIT has to be respected, says PM

Autonomy of IIT has to be respected, says PM
New Delhi: The All India Faculty Federation (AIFF) of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) met Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh today at his residence. The meeting comes after two weeks of dissent following the 'one nation, one test' proposal announced by the Human Resource Development ministry headed by Kapil Sibal.

The AIFF submitted a letter to the PM, opposing the decision of a Joint Entrance Test or JEE. In the hard-hitting letter, the dissenting body says the autonomy of the IITs must be restored. The letter requests the PM to let the IITs decide whether to accept, change or outrightly rejects the new proposal by the HRD ministry along with the IIT Council. (Read)

The letter also states any changes to the admission process be brought into effect in 2014 or later, stressing the current IIT-JEE and AIEEE must continue in the coming year.

The letter written to the PM rejects all reasons given by the HRD ministry, saying the stress of exams will increase with all students made to take the Common Entrance Test (CET) in the new proposal, the number of tutorials centres are bound to increase and normalisation of marks would need more research to make it a sound idea.

AIFF is among other bodies opposing the idea. The minister, though, has maintained that it is a unanimous decision that came about after two years of deliberations.
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