Evening colleges on their way out

Campus development

It seems, Delhi University has become a hub for changes. First, the implementation of the semester system, then the four-year undergraduate programme and now it is set to usher one more change – evening colleges are all set to bid adieu and will gradually shift to the regular morning mode.

The basic reason for this change is because the evening colleges which were originally established for working students have regular students now.

Two evening colleges — Deshbandhu College (Evening) and Ram Lal Anand (Evening) have already switched to morning hours. “The evening college of Deshbandhu has been rechristened Ramanujan College,” shares its principal Ajay Kumar Arora, “and we have already started holding classes in the morning. Right now they have only 12 rooms and we are soon going to start constructing a new building for them. The new campus will be spread over seven acres and it will also have hostels. Right now we are sharing our things but soon they will be a separate entity all together.

“The original idea for an evening college is no more and also the serious component was less in the evening classes. Those who don’t get admission in the morning colleges take admission in the evening ones – which was not the basic idea. It was also quite difficult for students living far away to stay till late – especially girls. So, this is a positive step for betterment of the students.”

Ram Lal Anand (Evening) is now Arya Bhatt College. Talking about its benefits Dr S A Jaffri, the college principal says, “It will be definitely beneficial for students as they will get more hours to study and can also devote time to extracurricular activities. It was actually the need of the hour because evening colleges had actually lost their utility.”

The shift can also be seen in the context of the undergraduate programme to a four-year structure because the schedule of classes under the four-year programme is
expected to become more tight and with this, the number of lectures will also increase. So, it will be difficult to conduct classes till late.

There are nearly 11 evening colleges in DU – Shyamlal College, Sri Aurobindo College, Shaheed Bhagat Singh College, Motilal Nehru College, Deshbandhu College, Zakir Husain College, Satyawati College, Ram Lal Anand College, Dyal Singh College and Pannalal Girdharlal Dayanand Anglo Vaidic College (PGDAV).

Another teacher from Dyal Singh College too says that it is positive step by the University. “Evening colleges were more of an outing than actual college. Also students who come in the morning have fresh minds and are energetic whereas if the timetable starts at 5 pm, the seriousness towards study is less.”