NASHIK :
With a view to make higher education available in rural, hilly and tribal areas of the state, the government has come up with a time bound program of sanctioning new satellite centers.
Accordingly, new satellite center will be sanctioned from the academic year 2021-22. Interested institutions have to submit applications along with documents to the concerned universities by September 30.
Universities will have to accept applications online. The application received by the universities will be scrutinized by the Board of Trustees and the verification committee will have to submit a report to the Vice-Chancellor by October 15.
In the meantime, the organization which has found errors in its proposal or documents will be notified by October 20. They will have to report the error to the university by October 30. Eligible applications and their reports will be submitted to the Chairmen of the Board of Governors of the Universities by 15th November.
The Vice-Chancellor of the University shall constitute as many expert committees may be required at the University level. The expert committee will make direct visit till December 15 and examine whether the new satellite center is ready as per the list of concerned institutions or submit a report along with video photographs to the Vice-Chancellor through the Chairman of the Board of Governors by January 15.
The university will not recommend institutions that do not meet the infrastructure requirements. Eligibility and disqualification will be notified by the Vice-Chancellor to the concerned eligible institutions by January 25.
Also, applications of all eligible institutes with approval recommendation will be submitted by the universities to the government by April 1. It is likely that permission will be given by the government by June 15 on the proposal received from the universities.
In this regard, all the universities will have to prepare an annual plan every year with a five-year master plan.
The districts in which the overall pass percentage in college education is less than the national average smwill be given top priority for rural and tribal areas. Approval proposals will have to be recommended, excluding the commercial AICTE and NCTE approved courses of the same new Satellite Center for that academic year.
If the location of the satellite center is not in a rural and tribal area, then 200 km from the main center of the college. Can be set up within a radius area (in exceptional cases this limit can be extended up to 300 km). However, the Satellite Center may not be outside the jurisdiction of the University.
At least one skill certificate course must be started at the Satellite Center. The Satellite Center can be used to increase the use of online or Open Distance Learning (ODL) system as suggested in the National Education Policy, so the necessary information technology, system must be available in the Satellite Center. Preference based grading system must be adopted at undergraduate and postgraduate level.