PANJIM: Goa University (GU) has sought the State government’s permission to bend the mandatory rules of domicile and mother tongue to fill pending vacancies which are piling up due to failure to find suitable Goan candidates for the posts.
Six months ago the varsity wrote to the Laxmikant Parsekar government seeking to extend the relaxation that it was granted to fill 68 regular and four temporary posts in 2013. But the file has been caught in red-tape and GU still awaits a response from the Chief Minister’s Office.
Officials stated that the apex educational institution is finding it difficult to fill up vacancies and these touched 83, comprising 24 professors, 39 associate professors and 20 assistant professors. The relaxation had been made precisely because GU failed to find capable Goan candidates so far.
The State’s only university, until 2013, had advertised for 68 regular and four temporary positions, but only 15 posts could be filled and that included four internal promotions. This was despite then Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar circumventing the basic rules to recruit competent faculty members.
Two years down the line, GU has again moved the government to extend the relaxation to permit recruitment of eligible and qualified teaching staff. It would not only allow Goan candidates to apply for the required positions, but would also open avenues for aspirants from other States. However, even after three reminders the government continues to give the request a cold shoulder.
“If we do not get a reply or the government rejects our proposal, we will have no option but to impose the mandatory residence certificate and knowledge of Konkani,” GU Registrar V P Kamat said. He apprehends that the old rules would reduce the inflow of good candidates and decline chances to fill up the vacancies.
The situation could worsen in the coming years if the posts continue to remain unfilled as about 20 professors will attain the age of superannuation in the next two years or so. “It will add up to the total number of vacancies…” he added.
The Department of Chemistry has a maximum of nine vacancies, but the vacuum is spread across all 23 departments.
The university is not in favour of contractual appointments arguing that it needs quality teaching faculty to elevate its teaching standards. “We don’t want to dilute the quality of faculty, which is why there are certain requirements. Contractual appointments are not a remedy to substitute regular teaching. It will ruin the teaching,” Kamat said.
At the request of Goa government, GU had recently submitted a proposal to double enrolment by the year 2020 in the post graduate programmes but considering the present crisis, this may be a distant dream.
The government defends its stand. Sources said they have received complaints that the relaxation was an attempt to give easy access to non-Goans to take over faculty positions at GU. In one of the letters sent by the Faculty of Hindi to the government, the complainants stated that though GU had eligible internal teaching staff, the university appointed a north Indian. “We have to do justice when we speak of creating employment for local youth. With such a complaint, we have to give it a thought,” a senior bureaucrat at the Secretariat said.
Meanwhile, it has been reliably learnt that the file granting GU permission to advertise the posts was cleared earlier this week. There is, however, no confirmation about the relaxation.
