CAG Report - Audit Finds OU Failed To Have Enough Teachers
While student numbers rose from 7,932 to 2017-18 to 19,879 in 2021-22, the faculty strength fell from 941 to 787: Comptroller and Auditor General report
HYDERABAD: Osmania University, which had been seeing a steady rise in enrolments, has been at the same time severely affected by a shortage of teachers, with the numbers of the latter falling even as the university was admitting more students with each passing year.
The Comptroller and Auditor General report on OU’s functioning from 2017 to 2022, when the BRS was in power, said while student numbers rose from 7,932 to 2017-18 to 19,879 in 2021-22, the faculty strength fell from 941 to 787. While the recommended faculty student ratio (FSR) as per the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) should be 1:15, OU lagged far behind this benchmark with its FSR standing at 1:26 in 2021-22, the CAG report said.
In response to queries on this matter during the audit by the CAG, the government in 2024 responded that it was appointing part-time lecturers to maintain FSR. The CAG said this was not acceptable as per the NIRF regulations. Similar was the case with non-teaching staff with the report finding that OU had 1,091 vacancies, constituting 34 per cent of sanctioned strength of gazetted, non-gazetted, technical, and Class IV employees.
One of the fallouts of the poor FSR was indicated in the time taken by the university not being able to enforce completion of PhD degrees by students, with four years given to regular and five to part-time students to do so. The CAG said that of the 2,887 scholars who completed their PhD course between 2017-18 to 2022-23, only 1,222 had completed the degree within the stipulated time. As many as 1,665 students took between seven and 30 years to complete their studies, the report said.
OU’s record of dragged-out doctorates
1-6 years – 1,222
7-10 years – 1,175
11-15 years – 369
16-20 years – 86
21-25 years – 25
26-30 years – 10
Financial mismanagement resulting in losses to OU
Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA) – ₹1.12 crore
Unused development grants – ₹18.78 crore
Diverted Centenary Celebration grants to pay salaries – ₹3.96 crore
Unused Library grants – ₹50 lakh
Non-revision of lease rate for petrol bunk – ₹1.49 crore
Irregular expenditure on purchase of new vehicles – ₹19.8 lakh
National Mission for Teachers and Teaching scheme – Central assistance lost - ₹2.85 crore
