Sukhmani Kooner, Pune
In the wake of a recent Karnataka High Court ruling, thousands of guest faculty members in government degree colleges face an uncertain future. The court mandates adherence to UGC norms, requiring the Karnataka State Eligibility Test (K-SET), National Eligibility Test (NET), or a Ph.D. for permanent and guest faculty positions. This ruling has sparked widespread anxiety and outrage among educators working in the government first-grade colleges, who may be left jobless due to stringent qualification requirements.
Government first-grade colleges had guest faculty who had qualifications uptill a master’s degree. However, with the recent ruling, their future remains uncertain as the Collegiate Education Department has stopped recruiting temporarily. Some of the guest faculties are pointing out that when these rules were made mandatory a few years back, they had urged the UGC to not apply these to them. Due to less pay and 8 hours of teaching in a week, the guest faculty were then exempted from the UGC qualification benchmark.
The University Grants Commission was established under the Ministry of Education in 1956. The key role of the UGC is to boost university education in India, set and maintain teaching, research, and examination standards, and provide grants to universities and colleges that meet the set standards.
The Collegiate Education Department opened applications on August 30 for the recruitment of guest lecturers to fill the vacant positions in government first-grade institutions for the 2024–2025 academic year. As per the regulations, candidates who held guest faculty positions in 2023–2024 could choose to stay on at the same college.
The salary range for recently hired guest faculty members who possess UGC-required qualifications, such as a Master’s degree, is ₹35,000 to ₹40,000, depending upon seniority. For guest faculty members who do not possess UGC-required qualifications, the salary range is ₹31,000 to ₹36,000, depending on seniority.
A lawsuit was filed in the Karnataka High Court by a few candidates who meet the UGC’s requirements to prevent guest lecturers without the necessary credentials from being appointed.
With the recent court order, 5,890 out of the total guest faculty in the state across 430 government-grade colleges according to the 2023-24 data, are on the brink of losing their jobs because they only hold a master’s degree.