VC mulls introducing fuel audit in MU

Prof P S Yadapadithaya, vice chancellor of Mangalore University, said that there are plans to introduce ‘fuel audit’ in the university to help audit fuel usage both accurately and precisely.

He was chairing the first academic council meeting of the academic year 2019-20 on Wednesday.

The vice chancellor said that there are many vehicles in the university. “The log book on the usage of the vehicles will be verified every month. Stress will be laid on the proper maintenance of log books to know how many vehicles had been allotted for usage. To track the vehicles, all the vehicles of the university – including the vice chancellor’s – will be fitted with the GPS tracking system,” he explained.

Financial discipline

Stressing on the need to have financial discipline, the newly appointed vice-chancellor said that an expert committee will be constituted to settle the issue of audit objections and audit recovery and to usher in financial prudence in financial dealings of the university. The committee will be asked to work within the deadline. It will also look into the gap analysis on the budget and the revised budget, he explained.

Further, he said measures will be taken to strengthen the financial department of the university to check the loopholes in the system. “All the procedural lapses that result in audit objections will be checked. The computerisation of the finance department and training for the personnel at the department to make them competent will also be taken up,” he added.

Think tank

A think tank will be constituted soon to suggest the future programmes of the university. It will have experts, academicians, administrators and teaching experts. It will meet once every three months suggestions on various development activities and also on mobilising resources to take up the developmental works, said the vice-chancellor.

Prof Yadapadithaya said that the UGC, in its recent guidelines, had set a six-month deadline to fill up sanctioned teaching and non-teaching faculties. “In the guidelines, the UGC had warned of withholding grants for failing to meet the deadline. I will discuss the issue with the higher education minister,” he added.