Hyderabad, Osmania Varsities Given More Autonomy 

Hyderabad: The University of Hyderabad and Osmania University today welcomed the UGC announcement granting them greater autonomy in academic, administrative, and financial matters. The two universities said they were gearing up to put in place a series of initiatives to take full advantage of the status.

Authorities at the two varsities said they are in discussions with the departments, centres and faculty on how best the autonomy can be implemented across the varsities.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) yesterday approved full autonomy for 62 higher educational institutions, including University of Hyderabad (UoH), a central university and Osmania University (OU), a state university, which have maintained high standards of excellence. The decision was taken at a UGC meeting where five central universities, 21 state universities, 26 private universities besides 10 other colleges were granted autonomy under the Autonomous Colleges Regulation.

Reacting to the honour, UoH Vice-Chancellor, Prof Appa Rao Podile thanked students, faculty, and administrative staff for their consistent efforts that enabled the University to become one of the top universities in the country. The Vice-Chancellor will soon initiate a multi-layered dialogue within the University and evolve mechanisms to translate this newly granted autonomy into "our quest for institution-of-eminence ranking", a release from UoH said.

OU Vice Chancellor Prof S Ramachandram also expressed happiness over the granting of autonomy and thanked the entire university teaching and non-teaching  staff, research scholars and alumni. He said Osmania University has been making efforts towards achieving the excellence by ushering in several reforms, adding, the decision by the UGC in the centenary year of the university comes as a double delight. (PTI)