PhD admission protest: Bangalore University campus may shut on March 15

Students say the university has violated the University Grants Commission (UGC) rules in the conduct of the entrance test for PhD programmes

Bangalore University's Jnanabharathi campus is likely to be deserted on Monday as students have called for a one-day shutdown in protest over PhD admissions.

Hundreds of students seeking to pursue PhD courses have come under the banner of the Bangalore University Postgraduate and Research Students Union as the BU prepares to conduct the second round of counselling.

They say the university has violated the University Grants Commission (UGC) rules in the conduct of the entrance test for PhD programmes.

Read | BU syndicate members accuse VC of unilateral decisions, violations

Their biggest grievance is BU's decision to allow students pursuing fourth-semester postgraduate courses to take the PhD test, which is "in violation of the UGC rules". "This decision has snatched opportunities from many of us who have been waiting for the past four or five years to get a PhD seat," said one of the students.

Another "violation" is not relaxing the eligibility criteria for students belonging to SC/ST and other backward communities. "This is a clear injustice to eligible candidates," the PhD aspirant said. Then there are grievances about the question paper. For example, the PhD test syllabus is the same as that of the Karnataka State Entrance Test (KSET). "The university didn't even bother to change the title of the syllabus used for KSET. This benefited students who took KSET," another student said.