While the pandemic has blanketed the academic calendar with uncertainty, the University Grants Commission (UGC) has called for a meeting of the two panels which were looking into the matter. The University Grants Commission had earlier constituted two committees to fill in recommendations pertaining to the academic loss and online classes in the wake of coronavirus outbreak.
One committee was chaired by Prof RC Kuhad, a former member of the UGC and Vice-Chancellor of the Central University of Haryana. The committee was given the responsibility to look into the issues related to examinations and academic calendar. The other committee was chaired by Prof Nageshwar Rao, Vice-Chancellor of Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), and was asked to look into issues pertaining to online education.
Both the committees submitted their reports on 24th April. While one committee suggested postponing the commencement of the academic session from July to September, the other suggested that Universities should conduct online examinations if they have the infrastructure and means to do so or conduct the hand-written examinations when the lockdown ends, probably in July.
The UGC secretary Rajnish Jain confirmed these reports. He also marked flexibility in the upcoming guidelines as different states have been hit by the virus with different intensities and the resources of the Universities would be crucial to conduct online examinations.
Image Source – The Print
