Madrasa Mafia Active

Metro News/ Hyderabad : Madrasas in Hyderabad have become a source of easy money for opportunists who are exploiting the soft corner that many people have towards them. Most of the people who establish such Madrasas are from Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh. Even the students are brought from other states, mostly from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand. As city people have been making liberal donations, such ‘institutions’ have mushroomed in   the city.   

Madrasas in City
-Nearly 350 small Madrasas are functioning in city most of which are established by outsiders
-Madrasa mentors draining lakhs of rupees in the name of donations
-Almost all the Madrasas have their own building
-Number of bigger Madrasas is about 20 which collect huge amount of donations, alms, zakat from the businessmen and general public
-Number of students do not cross even 10,000
-Most of the students are outsiders

In a survey conducted in different places in the city revealed that in the Old city, there are two Madrasas for every five kilometers. Most of the Madrasas, which should teach the basic Islamic teachings, are now apparently deviating from that purpose. One such Madrasa is located Old Malakpet. It is being run in a three room rented home and with 57 children most of them hailing from other states. Some students from sub urban areas were also in it. Care taker of the Madrasa said that yearly expenditure of it is Rs 11 to 12 lakhs which is provided by the generous people.

Another one is located at Yakut Pura area which is being run from a double storied building from 1998. Established in the year 1993, it has 150 students most of them from Bihar, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and other states. Monthly expenditure of this Madrasa is Rs 1 lakh. According to the chief patron of it, the yearly expenditure is nearly Rs 1 lakh. 

Lack of audit system & blind belief is leading to the mushrooming of such Madrasas 

All the expenditure is being met by people staying nearby. Most of the students studying here are from Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and other states. Several Muslim scholars said that taking advantage of public goodwill towards these centres, several opportunists have started their ventures in the city. A local preacher and Islamic scholar Wasimul Haq said that lack of audit system and blind belief of people is leading in mushrooming of such make shift Madrasas in the city. Several other Ulema (clerics) opined that such Madrasas would keep changing their places in city. 

They don’t remain at one place. Abdul Ahad, a care taker of Madarsa, said that people have to identify fake Madrasas before giving any kind of financial aid to them. He said that people in Hyderabad proved to be more generous towards helping religious institutions and several bogus Madrassas sprouted in the city exploiting the situation. People donate huge amounts to Madarsas and also provide several other things like furniture, necessary items and other basic needs of the school.

No Clarity on Non Performers

Metro News/ Hyderabad : Although the counselling process in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana for admission to engineering colleges has begun, the fate of the colleges identified by the Telangana government for poor performance is not clear. Whether the government would allow such colleges to admit students this year remains unanswered. The governments of both the States are not forthcoming on the fate of engineering colleges with substandard infrastructure and below par performance.

The AFRC and the university granting affiliation would decide the category on the basis of performance and infrastructure of the colleges

Around 315 engineering colleges in Telangana and 330 in AP have been asked by the EAMCET committee to participate in counselling.
The Task Force committee, in its report, had revealed that more than 120 colleges were running with ‘a poorest of the poor’ infrastructure and ought to be shut down by the government. The committee, appointed in 2012 (before bifurcation), submitted its report in July 2014. The task force report revealed that only 10 percent colleges have a good track record in respect of results and only a few of them have good infrastructure. 

The committee had surveyed 680 engineering colleges, but only 120 out of 700 colleges submitted their performance and infrastructure reports to the committee. The EAMCET committee officials informed that list of SW1 colleges (with good track record) and SW2 colleges in Telangana would be forwarded to the Telangana government by August 16 and to the AP government by August 15. It is not clear how many colleges figured in SW 1 and SW 2, as this has to be decided by the Admissions and Fee Regulation Committee (AFRC) members. Telangana Engineering and Professional Colleges Management Association (TEPCMA) chairman N Goutham Rao said that all the member colleges of his organisation were called for participation in counselling.

He, however, said that he had no data on how many colleges were listed in SW1, SW2 and SW3 categories. The AFRC and the university granting affiliation would decide the category on the basis of performance and infrastructure of the colleges. Colleges with better performance and infrastructure would be put in SW1 category; minority and second rate colleges are listed in SW 2 category, while the remaining colleges are under SW3 category. Asked about the weeding out of colleges with poor infrastructure in the State, Telangana Technical Education Commissioner Sailaja Ram Iyer said that it would be decided by the State government and AFRC and she was only concerned with the admissions.

Urban Oriented Pattern

Mohammed Younus/ Hyderabad : Anxiety over the discrepancies in the UPSC Preliminary Aptitude Test examination pattern is steadily growing with each passing day as the present pattern only gives advantage to Hindi-speaking candidates and urban aspirants. UPSC aspirants and educationists are questioning the commission’s urban-oriented examination pattern and have demanding the UPSC to revoke CSAT completely from the examination.

Aspirants from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana said that the orientation of the examination pattern is dangerously tilted towards urban students and hindering the rural aspirants from even qualifying the preliminary examination. An aspirant, Uday Kumar, said that disparity among the rural and urban students has been increased since the inception of this pattern. He said, “This examination pattern is completely benefiting urban candidates and putting rural students are at loss.” Noted civil service trainer R C Reddy said that UPSC authorities are testing the mathematical and technical skills rather than testing administrative skills of the appearing skills of the aspirants.

He said, “Out of 80 questions asked in CSAT papers only six pertain to administrative skillset and others are related to mathematics.” Another aspirant K Venkat Yadav said, “The Centre has taken a decision to remove 20 marks of the English comprehensive component that further cut shorts the marks of south Indian students, as it does not have negative markings. Giving 30 marks for qualification in Paper I and 70 marks in Paper II (CSAT) is unscientific.” Another civil service trainer Padmaja Rani said that the examination pattern is totally unscientific and added, “Students coming from urban background are getting more marks in CSAT because the questions are given in English and Hindi and south Indians students could not understand it in a short period of 90 seconds.

That is how they are filtered out of the competition in the beginning itself.” She further said that this disparity is leading to higher cut offs and decrease in the number of qualifying students from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. She said, “Questions asked in CSAT are only meant to assess mathematical and English languages skills and urban candidates obviously have an edge over rural students.” Aspirants informed that earlier around 70 students from AP and Telangana used to get selected in UPSC, but not this number has come down to 30. Students complain that different qualification marks of the Interview boards also an unscientific method. Students and aspirants are agitating against the alleged discriminatory examination patter of the UPSC in preliminary paper II which plays a decisive role in qualifying.

Telugu Desam leader R Krishnaiah and educationist R C Reddy extended their support to the cause of agitating students. R Krishnaiah said that any attempt to discriminate the south Indian and rural students and demanded to remove current UPSC chairman. Noted educationist R C Reddy said that most of the political leaders don’t know what exactly the crux of the problem is. He said that the CSAT was aimed at assessing technical and mathematical skills rather than assessing administrative skills. Students have been staging dharna at Indira Park for last three days demanding scrapping of CSAT completely or include all regional languages in the examination.

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UPSC Aspirants Say

Mohammed Younus/ Hyderabad : With the Centre deciding to delink English comprehensive language component of paper II in the civil services preliminary examination from grading, students in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana have contended that the provision of delinking English would in no way benefit themnor those coming from other regional language backgrounds.

Though the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has not yet given a directive to notify the changes, students are in a dilemma over the conduct of the preliminary examination scheduled to be held on August 24. Agitating UPSC aspirants in the city said that the inclusion of Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) in preliminary examination itself was not a wise step. A UPSC aspirant Vinay Kumar said that if the Centre gives relaxation for Hindi language students, it would amount to depriving benefits (ranks/marks) to students from other regional language backgrounds.

He said, “English comprehension part contains questions in Hindi and English, and no other language and if at all any relaxation is given, Hindi students alone stand to benefit from the order.” He said that interpreting the tough English pattern would be a difficult job for students who studied in regional languages. IAS Academy’s Honorary Director Laxmaiah said that if the central government or UPSC wanted to give relaxation, it should include all regional languages in CSAT examination or else scrap it altogether. He said, “Including only Hindi in English comprehensive test amounts to discrimination amongst other regional languages and it lacks uniformity.”

The administrative efficiency must be tested, but not the language skills as far as selection of IAS officers is concerned, he added.
He said that the current decision-makers in UPSC have designed CSAT pattern in such a way that it values mathematics and language skills, but not administrative skills and general studies. Only students from IITs, IIMs and other top institutions can get through the preliminary examination using this pattern, he added.

Inspection Effect

Mohammed Younus/ Hyderabad : With the Telangana government deciding to do away with tuition fee reimbursement and replacing it with Financial Assistance to Students of Telangana (FAST), admissions to private engineering colleges are likely to see a sharp decline this year. Adding to their woes is the nativity rule, which considers 1956 as the cut off year for availing FAST.

Stringent rules for FAST, inspections to spell doom for several colleges having poor infrastructure

Educationists said that the latest round of re-inspection of engineering colleges by Jawahar Lal Nehru Technological University task force officials in the State earlier this week would surely spell doom for many colleges, as most of them were found ‘not maintaining’ the required standards. They said that around 100 engineering colleges may have to shut down if inspections are conducted in a strict manner, as directed by Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao. The CM ordered these inspections after receiving concrete information that most of the engineering colleges did not fulfill the criteria of an ‘ideal engineering college’ as prescribed by the All-India Council for Technical Education.

At the same time, more than 120 of the 335 colleges in the State were on government radar for having poor infrastructure. The recently released Government Task Force report on the functioning of private engineering colleges has painted a grim picture of infrastructure in private engineering colleges across the state. Confirming these fears, Telangana Engineering Professional College Managements Association (TEPCMA) chairman N Goutham Rao said that 1956 as cut off would indeed have an adverse impact on admissions.

Reacting to the ongoing inspection of the engineering colleges, he said that inspection was already done in May 2014 and re-inspection was not necessary. He said that these days, parents and students themselves were inspecting the colleges before taking admissions and termed it as ‘social inspection’.

Last year, around 50 per cent seats in engineering colleges were left vacant due to the chaos surrounding the bifurcation of state. In 2012, around one lakh seats remained vacant, he said. TEPMCA member I Krishna Rao said that government has to give some time for colleges to update their infrastructure and to attain the standards prescribed by government. Telangana Government Junior College Lecturers Association president P Madhusudan Reddy said that several colleges may have to close down if inspection is done as per the rule book.

College Managements Cry Foul

Mohammed Younus/ Hyderabad : Engineering college managements demanded the Telangana government to release the pending fee reimbursement dues without linking it with the state-level task force report on the functioning of engineering colleges. Calling it an untimely report, the college managements expressed their discomfort over the timing of release of the report. The report was released when the EAMCET counseling for admissions into the engineering colleges of the state have been stalled due to the indecision on fee reimbursement and nativity in Telangana.

Telangana Engineering and Professional College Management Association (TEPCMA) chairman N Goutham Rao said on Thursday that the time selected to release the findings of task force was not right. He said that this may lead to students deter from taking admissions into engineering courses and would bring disrepute to the higher education. He said that the government should give time to the underperforming colleges and if still lapses are found, action should be taken against the erring colleges. He claimed that most of the colleges reached the stage of poor performance only because of the delay in payment of fee reimbursement dues.

The task force report revealed that only 10 per cent of colleges have a good track record of results and only a few have good infrastructure. The report also claimed that out of Rs 4,000 crore released by the government only Rs 1,500 crore was reaching the real students. The report said that several colleges were established only to take the benefits of fee reimbursement. Most of the colleges don’t even have proper faculty and infrastructure but they showed more number of students every year.

The task force appointed on August 11, 2012 inspected 685 engineering colleges across both the states between October 2012 and March 2013. Only 120 out of 700 colleges submitted their performance, infrastructure and other reports.

Regularization Row...

Mohammed Younus / Hyderabad : Controversy over the State government’s decision to regularise contract employees is drawing flak from student community following which government seems to be in a fix over the implementation of its popular pre-poll promise. As of now, the State government is firm on the decision and said that it had fulfilled the poll promise given to the people before elections. But the legal tangles may cause an obstacle in the implementation.

The controversy over the issue has been escalating with the growing protests by the student groups opposing the government’s decision. Student leaders expressed their apprehensions that if government regularises the contract employees it would hamper their chances of employment. Government sources said that it had only announced the decision which involved several modalities. Ultimately, all contract employees would not come under the ambit of the scheme, opined a senior official.

Telangana Non-Gazetted Officers’ Central Union president G Deviprasad Rao said that State government would not move ahead blindly with the scheme. He said that the performance, eligibility, qualification among other criteria would be examined before regularisation. “Out of around 35,000 contract employees working in various departments several of them would be cut short after verifying their appointment, qualification and other criteria,” he added. On the other hand it is a non-issue for several student unions as they allege that the latest anti-government protests were orchestrated and flamed by some political parties. 

Telangana Students Unions JAC convener D Balraju Yadav said that there were large number of contract employees in education, municipal administration and healthcare sectors. Defending government’s stand, Balraju said that it would not simply go ahead but all the needed qualifications would be assessed before the regularisation. “With this filtration only few thousand contract employees may be regularized. The other students need not worry as state government has already promised to create jobs for the educated,” he said. As per the data available with Telangana Employees Union leaders, there are around 1.5 lakh vacancies in government departments. 

The number of contract employees was somewhere around 32,000 to 35,000. Education, irrigation, municipal administration, health care and revenue department have the more number of contract employees. Moreover, as per Act 2 of 1994 and a directive of Supreme Court no government is allowed to regularize the contract employees. Regularization was done in corporations and semi government departments but not in government departments, said a senior official in the education department. The objective behind agitating university students was to abolish the regularisation of gazetted posts as it would amount to the contempt of court and damage the chances of highly educated unemployed youth.