A glance at the numbers reveals the pressure they are under. Over 800 colleges having over 4 lakh students and ten faculties come under their purview. 32 new colleges would be added from the new academic year starting in July and it will only add their woes.

According to Nagpur University sources, it conducts over 1,000 exams and sets up nearly 8,000 question papers and also does their valuation every year. Its officials also look after declaration and distribution of results, issuing photocopies and their revaluation, making seating arrangements for examinations, and sending registered mails to students and colleges among others.

To do all this work, the university has less than 200 employees, of whom 80 are clerks, to run the show. Not a single employee has been recruited in the section since the last five years even though the number of colleges has grown. Till 2002, Nagpur University was having only 250 affiliated colleges, in 2007-08 it was 600, in 2009-10 they grew to 775 and in 2011-12 it crossed 800 mark - the highest among all universities.

Sources revealed that it had become even more difficult for them to conduct exams of professional courses like engineering, MBA and law. Due to semester pattern, these are conducted twice a year and so are other formalities like results, evaluation and revaluation. However, exam section officials were never consulted while granting new colleges or starting courses. They don't even have a place on the important bodies like management and academic councils. If they protested, they were accused of being "inefficient".

Get information on Kanpur University

The signs of crumbling were evident from the fact that series of paper leaks were happening and revaluation results were being delayed. Sources said shortage of approved teachers for evaluation was also hampering their work and ongoing strike by the teachers for their sixth pay commission arrears was making matters worse.

Though Controller of Examinations (CoE) Siddharth Kane could not be contacted as he had instructed the media to talk to PRO office, a senior official on the condition of anonymity admitted that their section was indeed heavily burdened. Registrar Mahesh Yenkie had recently informed that Nagpur University had sent a proposal to the state government for filling up of 391 posts.

Exam Section without automation

Another disturbing fact that came out to light was that the entire exam section was still working manually. In this year's budget, Nagpur University had sanctioned Rs 5.80 crore for modernization/computerization of this section, but no progress has been made.

Source: TOI