Delhi University hit with contempt notice over workforce management system
The Delhi High Court has issued a contempt notice to Delhi University for not implementing a biometric workforce management system for its teachers.
Reported in the Deccan Herald, according to a court petition, seven months after the mandate from the division bench, Delhi University still has not implemented the system.
“As per the court order, the respondent was required to adopt biometric system for attendance, as assured to this court, which means within a maximum period of three months. But they have failed to do so even though a further period of four months has elapsed,” the contempt petition said.
Interestingly, the university had planned to introduce the biometric system in 2009, but withdrew the decision as the Delhi University Teacher’s Association went on strike in protest. At this point, its unclear if the implementation of this system has been halted for the same reason.
According to India’s University Grants Commission, universities and colleges must ensure a minimum of 30 weeks of actual teaching by faculty members. Consequently, the workload of teachers should not be less than 40 hours a week for 180 teaching days.
Many schools in various regions of the world are looking to install biometric attendance systems or have done so recently. These systems are typically for teacher attendance, student attendance or student payment systems. In some cases deployments are successful, but in others they are met with resistance, as this system has been in Karnataka.
Reported previously in BiometricUpdate.com, teachers in government schools in Andhra Pradesh have threatened to strike against a proposed biometric attendance system.
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