Despite Maharashtra Higher and Technical Education Minister Uday Samant’s announcement earlier this month that the Mumbai University will start using its new library building from March 15, the building still awaits its Occupancy Certificate (OC) without which it cannot be made operational.
The issue was raised on the first day of the Mumbai University’s senate meeting on Tuesday, the same day on which the library was expected to start functioning in the new building. Senate member Surpiya Karande raised the issue in the house asking for the status of the new library building. Responding to the query, Pro-Vice Chancellor (VC) Dr Ravindra Kulkarni said, “The work is yet in progress and we expect that the building will be ready for inauguration by March end.”
Another senate member, Vaibhav Thorat, who had originally raised the issue of poor condition of the Jawaharlal Nehru Library’s Kalina campus, said, “The books and research papers continue to remain in the same state at the the old library building.”
The Indian Express had last month reported about the library’s poor condition. Samant had visited the library and a review meeting was arranged earlier this month. After the review meeting it was announced by Samant that work was in progress and the new building would be ready by March 15.
Samant was unavailable for comment.
Meanwhile, Vice-Chancellor Dr Suhas Pednekar announced an end-to-end technology-driven system to resolve grievances related to the university’s exam department during the senate meeting. This was in response to several students’ grievances raised by senate members. Senate member Pradeep Sawant shared how students have received marksheets without required stamps or signatures. “It is a technical issue but students have to keep making rounds of the s exam department and spend hours in the queue to resolve the issue,” he said.
Pednekar responded, “This technology-driven process will make it easier and convenient for students to submit their grievances and check for updates. The university will allocate appropriate funds to make the process functional at the earliest.”
Even though this is the budget session of the Mumbai University’s senate meeting, the first day ended with a question-answer session. The annual budget will be tabled Wednesday.