Punjab and Chandigarh College Teachers’ Union (PCCTU) debunked the claims of Punjab Chief Minister S. Parkash Singh Badal made in an interview to an English Daily (The Tribune), regarding developments during his tenure in the field of higher education by way of establishing new universities and colleges In a statement Dr. Jagwant Singh, President PCCTU debunked his claim that his Govt. has achieved what congress has not been able to achieve during 60 years by ‘adding 6 more universities to existing 3 and establishing 70 more colleges.’ He expressed surprise that Chief Minister at the age of 84 is telling white lies to befool public.
He said that there is need to put the record state. The Govt. of Punjab in its advertisements on the eve of elections had stated that previous Congress Govt. opened only 3 colleges while SAD-BJP Govt. has opened 17. The fact is that the initiative to open one college in 354 educationally backward districts of the country is of the Planning
Commission of India under the Chairmanship of P.M. of India, Dr. Manmohan Singh. Out of these 354 educationally backward districts 15 were identified in Punjab and same has been started under Govt. of India plan as university colleges, two colleges setup by previous Govt. as Govt. Colleges have been converted into university colleges.
The credit rightly belongs to Dr. Manmohan Singh and not S. Parkash Singh Badal.
Stating the facts regarding universities, Dr. Jagwant Singh pointed out that number of existing universities of the state when Badal took over as CM in 2007 was not 3 but 7. The names of these universities are – GNDU, Amritsar, PTU, Jalandhar, PAU, Ludhiana, GADVASU, Ludhiana, Pbi. University, Patiala, Baba Farid University of Health
Sciences, Faridkot, Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law, Rajpura and none has been added during his tenure. One university which has been added is Central University at Bhatinda and is a university established by Govt. of India. Other two universities i.e. Chitkara University and Guru Granth Sahib University are private universities.
He reminded Chief Minister that during his tenure more than 1700 teaching posts have fallen vacant in added colleges which were not allowed to be filled up resulting into serious damage to these institutions.
