College fails to renew recognition, PhD scholar’s application rejected

Nagpur: A philosophy of doctorate (PhD) scholar has been left in the lurch as the Nagpur University (NU) has rejected his application for registration even though his topic and synopsis were approved by the different committees of the university itself between April and October last year.
In its notification dated December 18, the PhD cell informed Bhojraj Pustode that his application for PhD programme registration has been rejected by the Research and Recognition Committee (RRC) because the research place — Dhanwate National College’s (DNC) post graduate department of Geography — is not recognized. Other departments offering courses like Commerce and Marathi are approved research centres at the college.

Interestingly, another scholar Ilora Pramanik’s application for the same course at the DNC research centre has been rejected for a different reason. The RRC notification states that the candidate was absent for the presentation while there is no mention about the centre’s recognition status.

The scholars had opted the research centre on the basis of information provided by NU on its PhD portal. The decision has left Pustode without a research centre as on date. Surprisingly, the NU had even accepted fee from the scholars and called them for presentations though the college lacked recognition.

NU officials said the PhD applications are subject to recognition status of the research centre and candidates are informed about it at the time of synopsis approval.

When TOI checked the portal on Monday, DNC was among the list of available centres with 20 vacant seats in geography. When asked about outdated entries on the portal, the officials blamed the private agency Promarc for maintaining the data regarding place of research, guide availability and other information.

As per NU data, besides DNC, JM Patel College Bhandara, NMD College Gondia and city-based Vasantrao Naik Institute of Arts and Social Sciences offer the course and are approved research centres. But, as on date, no seat is vacant at these centres.

This means, Pustode would have to migrate to another university or wait till a vacancy is created as DNC’s Geography department may not get recognition in near future.

DNC officials admitted that the NU had informed them well in advance and only Geography and Social Sciences lacked approval as postgraduate centres. As per new rules, the PG departments need to have two approved PhD guides. The college couldn’t appoint new professor due to state government’s ban on recruitment which was recently lifted. This means it will take a long time before the required appointment is made and the college applies for recognition.

Left in the lurch

* Candidate is NET cleared and exempted from PhD entrance test

* He applied for PhD in April 2018. Place of research and guide were selected at this stage

* Yet, NU called him for presentation before Research Advisory Committee (RAC) in May and approved his topic, synopsis

* In October, Research and Recognition Committee (RRC) too called him and okayed his topic and synopsis

* In December, after 8 months, he received letter stating his application has been rejected