After a lot of brouhaha over the passing of the Common Universities Act 2023, the state government has asked the 11 universities to start implementing the changes from Oct 9.

This comes days after the governor of Gujarat, Acharya Devvrat, granted permission for the Common Universities Act (Gujarat Public Universities Act, 2023) on Sept 28.

Chancellor selection

As per the Act, the universities where chancellors are already appointed will have a term of only three years.

Out of the 11 state universities, Gujarat University, Veer Narmad South Gujarat University, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda (MSU), and Shree Govind Guru University have permanent chancellors.

Whereas new chancellors will be appointed for a term of five years in seven universities, including Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University, Saurashtra University, Dr  Babasaheb Ambedkar Open University, Sardar Patel University, Hemchandracharya North Gujarat University, Krantiguru Shyamji Krishna Verma Kachchh University, and a university in Junagadh.

New search committees to be formed

These remaining universities currently have vice chancellors. Some of these universities have already appointed search committees, while in others, the search committees are about to conclude the process by nominating chancellors.

After the implementation of the Act, new search committees to appoint chancellors will be formed, dissolving the former ones.

As the new search committees will have four members instead of three, the government will issue a notification to the committee according to the Common Universities Act.

BoM formation in 30 days

The state government has been directed to constitute a board of management (BoM), an executive council, an academic council, and other committees within 30 days of the implementation of the Act.

The student body was directed to be replaced by a ‘board of management’ which will be the principal executive and final decision-making and policy-making authority of a university and responsible for administering all its affairs.

Moreover, if they fail to constitute the boards in the span of a month, senates, syndicates, and other councils will continue to exist for the next six months.

After the enactment of the Common Universities Act, the varsities will have common exams, a common syllabus, admission procedures, and a common credit curriculum framework.

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