Candidates reel under stress as JU stalls admission process for PhD under Faculty of Arts

Kolkata: Candidates who were selected in the provisional list for the PhD programme under the Faculty of Arts feel uncertain of the future and reel under mental stress after the admission process was stalled by the Jadavpur University (JU) authorities on November 17.

In a notice dated November 17, the authorities stated that the earlier notice of the admission schedule for the Ph.D. programme for Arts 2023 dated November 10 was revoked. “The admission to the Ph.D. programme 2023, under Faculty Council of Arts, has been withheld until further notice,” it stated.

According to the notice dated November 10, the listed students of 10 departments including Education, Comparative Literature, English, Film Studies, Bengali and Philosophy amongst others were supposed to report on allotted dates between November 21 and 24 for verification of documents. The same notice attached the department-wise provisional selection list.

“We (scholars) are dependent on fellowships to further our research. In such a situation, my name came in the PhD list published by the authorities and I was supposed to report on November 21 at the university’s Jadavpur campus. But on November 17, I came to know that the admission process has been withheld. It felt like they gave us an opportunity, just to snatch it right back,” a PhD aspirant told Millennium Post on request to remain anonymous.

According to interim Vice-Chancellor Buddhadeb Sau, the problem arose with the panel for continuing fellowship holders and others under “supernumerary.” He said that this is flouting the University Grant Commission (UGC) regulation which allows a cap of eight candidates under each professor and six candidates under each assistant professor.

Sau on Sunday suggested that the solution could be that the candidates will be initially enrolled under the respective department. Thereafter, as and when the vacancy under each professor arises, they can be registered by the departments.

However, a teacher of JU said that the UGC rule comes into play when the supervisors are being allocated to the students, which usually takes a year or two after the enrollment is done. “The withholding of the process is just prolonging the process and causing mental stress to students,” the teacher said.

Sau said that the matter will be taken up for the consideration of the Executive Council (EC), which is the highest governing body of the varsity. On November 4, the state education department had prevented JU from holding the EC meeting on the grounds that the university did not have a full-term V-C.

According to the news report, the Registrar Snehamanju Basu had written to the department wanting to hold a meeting on November 24. However, they are yet to get a response on that yet.