Panjab University scraps online classes till August 31, extends fee date

CHAND IGARH: Panjab University (PU) scrapped the nearly month-long online classes for the August-December semester that started from August 3, announcing to resume them from September and extending the last date to deposit fee to August 31.
A special committee took the decisions on Monday in the backdrop of student protests demanding the fee be waived off owing to the coronavirus pandemic.

For four consecutive days, all student parties have been holding demonstrations against the demand for fee for the first semester. Student parties along with the council want no fee to be paid till classes restart on the campus. On Monday, all student parties held a protest outside the administrative block. Minutes later, the special committee chaired by Prof Navdeep Goyal, a syndicate member, held its urgent meeting via video-conferencing.
The members decided that classes will now commence after students deposit the fee by August 31. Referring to practice of the campus that students were always asked to deposit fee to attend classes, a member said that the exemption was given as the semester was delayed due to the outbreak of novel coronavirus. Professor R K Singla, dean of university instructions, said the last date for payment of fee for the current semester was extended till August 31.
Another key decision was the faculty would resolve doubts of students of the January-March semester online till August 31. “The faculty will clear doubts or topic left over of previous semester from August 11,” he said, adding a policy is being framed to help students not in a position to pay the fee due to the coronavirus pandemic.