UGC bans distance education `deals'

new delhi: perturbed by the rising number of universities offering `distance mode' courses through franchisees without permission from the distance education council, the university grants commission has decided to ban the practice. the ugc has already begun writing to the universities it has identified in this connection. in most cases, the ``shop'' or franchisee is a private enterprise.the ugc has observed that in the name of collaboration, universities were entering into money-making deals. ``the franchisee conducts examinations for these courses on behalf of the university. this is illegal if done without seeking permission from the dec or informing the ugc,'' said ugc chairman hari gautam. ``if this trend is allowed to continue, someday these universities will want to offer bsc physics through distance education.'' ``several universities even specify that the courses are approved by the ugc, although we had never given permission to offer the courses under distance education,'' said gautam, pointing out an advertisement in a newspaper. m p s puri, assistant registrar with dec, confirmed that none of the universities identified had sought the council's permission to offer bsc courses through distance education. ``in fact, the increasing number of such cases has forced the ugc to scour newspapers for such misleading advertisements,'' an official with the ugc said. universities are offering distance education courses in bsc internet sciences, bsc in information systems, bachelors in computer application and management, msc in information technology, courses in software as well as masters in e-commerce, besides a wide range of post-graduate diplomas. interestingly, most courses on offer are related to it ^ a reminder of how hundreds of students were duped by a private computer institute recently which suddenly shut shop. among the errant universities on ugc's list are: kurukshetra university; punjab university, chandigarh; chennai university; pondicherry university; indraprastha university; punjab technical university; punjabi university, patiala; sikkim manipal university; guru jambeshwar university, hissar and utkal university, bhuvaneshwar.