The Hindu : New Delhi News : DU approves new courses

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Saturday, May 05, 2007
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New Delhi

DU approves new courses

Parul Sharma

Recommendations now await V-C's nod

NEW DELHI: Delhi University's Standing Committee for New Courses has given its nod to start new courses in different colleges from this coming academic year. However, it has decided to withhold other programmes like Anthropology, Forensic Science and Journalism for various reasons.

The Committee -- chaired by Pro-Vice Chancellor S. K. Tandon -- that met on Thursday has approved new courses for colleges like Miranda House, Aditi Mahavidyalaya, Gargi College Bhagini Nivedita, Bhim Rao Ambedkar College, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College, Keshav Mahavidyalaya and Bhaskaracharya College of Applied Sciences.

The recommendations made by the Standing Committee will now be sent to Vice-Chancellor Deepak Pental for clearance.

Aditi Mahavidyalaya will start B.A. (Honours) Geography, while Deen Dayal Upadhyaya and Keshav Mahavidyalaya are all set to launch the Bachelor of Business Studies programme from the coming session.

In fact, Keshav Mahavidyalaya has been the biggest benefactor as it has been permitted to start B.Com. (Hons) and B.A. (Hons) Psychology as well. "This college has just moved into a new building and they now have extra rooms and other necessary infrastructure, so new courses have been allotted to them," said Pradeep Kumar, one of the Committee members, who is also an elected member of the Academic Council.

Bhagini Nivedita College will introduce B.Sc. Applied Physical Sciences with Computer Science and Ambedkar College is to start B.Sc. Physical Sciences from the next academic session.

Besides a number of other courses, Gargi College and Miranda House will now offer B.A. (Hons) Business Economics and B.Sc. (Hons) Computer Science, respectively.

Though Bhaskaracharya College was not permitted to start a Bachelor's course in Anthropology, it can teach B.Sc. (Physics) from 2007 onward.

No green signal

Guru Tegh Bahadur Khalsa College and Rajdhani College, which had shown a keen interest in B.Sc. (Hons) Forensic Science, have not been given the green signal to introduce the new subject.

"The syllabus for Forensic Science has to be approved by the Academic Council, pending which the introduction of the course has been withheld," informed another member.

The extension of subjects like Anthropology and Journalism to other colleges has also been withheld.

"The University is thinking about how to deliver education in journalism. We have to look into the issue of which model is to be used for the subject. We do have an existing model and we are thinking whether we should carry on with the same model or think of an alternative one," said Prof. Tandon.

About Anthropology, he said: "There are issues on the sense of preparedness on the part of colleges in lab-based disciplines. These subjects have a strong element of fieldwork also. The lab facilities and the teacher-pupil ratio in the colleges have to be at the same level as it operates in the department. We need to look at all these aspects in a more integrated manner."

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