Chennai: The Madras high court has stayed an order of University Grants Commission and Distance Education Centre preventing Periyar University, Salem, from offering distance education programmes.
Justice M.M. Sundresh, before which a petition filed by Periyar University came up for hearing, passed the interiim order. In the petition, the university said it started correspondence courses from 2001-02. Under the distance education mode, the varsity has been offering 150 diploma, certificate, UG and PG courses in humanities, arts and sciences. The varsity has been recognised by UGC in 1998 and conferred with 12-B status in 2005. National Assessment and Accreditation Council had conferred the varsity with A-Grade.
The Distance Education Council granted provisional approval to Periyar University to conduct distance education programmes from 2001-02. In a communication to the university in August this year, the DEC had not granted institutional approval to Periyar University for its distance education programmes. The UGC has also prevented the university from admitting any student for programmes under Open/Distance Learning during 2015-16. Petitioner's counsel R. Suresh Kumar submitted that the order was illegal as no opportunity was given to the university.
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