Chandigarh 16 June:Today a meeting of the research scholars of Panjab University was held at the Students Centre where the problems of the scholars were deliberated. In all, 40 research scholars assembled at the meeting.
Initiating the discussion, Sumittar Singh Walia, research fellow from the department of English, highlighted the problems, including separate hostel for the research scholars, independent sitting space in the departments, provision of placements, better academic infrastructure and financial assistance. During the discussion the participants questioned the continuous rise in the tuition fee and hostel expenses. Many research scholars expressed serious concern over the lack of amenities for latest research on the campus. The Scholars felt that whenever the university is approached for requisite facilities, their voice is drowned into the continuous financial crunch the University is facing for the last one decade. B Alaxai, research fellow, department of Punjabi, during the course of the discussion pointed out central university status to PU as one of the alternatives to their long-standing problems.
Prof. Manjit Singh, Secretary PUTA, and Dr Akshaya Kumar, department of English were also invited at the meeting to explain the benefits of central university status to PU for the research scholars. It was explained at length, that the major beneficiaries of the central status to PU would be students and research scholars. Giving example of JNU, New Delhi, a central university, Prof. Singh told that the total annual fee of all categories of students in JNU is not more than Rs.400/- . Moreover students doing M.Phil and PhD would be eligible to Rs. 3000, and Rs. 5000 per month fellowship, respectively once PU becomes a central university.
In the meeting an Eleven member Adhoc Committee was constituted with the following members: Sumittar Singh Walia, (Convenor), B. Alaxai, (Co-convenor), Rajni, Gurpreet Kaur, Lovely Sharma, Punit Pandit, Vijay Chauhan, Surinder Kumar, Hari Nath, Sandeep Thind and Arvind Kumar Dwivedi.