Jharkhand assembly passes two private university bills amid protest

Ranchi: Amid the protest of BJP MLAs, two bills related to establishing private universities in Jharkhand got passed by the state assembly. The bills included Durga Soren University Bill 2023 and Jain University Bill 2023. The second bill is the same which the governor had returned following some technical mistake.

Minister Mithilesh Thakur justified the bill, saying it will help ensure an increase in enrolment in higher education, which is now only 17 percent in Jharkhand and the figure much less the national average of 23 percent.

BJP legislators Amit Mandal, Manish Jaiswal, Biranchi Narayan, Anant Ojha supported by CPI (ML) legislator Binod Singh had proposed to send the bill to a select committee saying an assembly committee has already been constituted to prepare a report on the infrastructure to all the 16 private universities already functional in the state and it would be proper to wait for the report of the committee before taking any step to establish a new private university in the state.

BJP legislator Biranchi Narayan said that information coming from across the state suggests that many universities do not have proper infrastructure and many private universities are doing nothing other than selling certificates. 

However, Minister Thakur, who had introduced the bill, did not agree to wait saying the government is serious about the private universities which are running without proper infrastructure and very soon a process will be started to root out them from the state. 

The bills were introduced and passed after the house cleared the budgetary demands of the labour and employment department with five other departments after a debate on the cut motion.