PLUS POINT
>> Some 20-odd faculty members in Goa's several colleges due to retire this year, are expected to benefit from the move if it fructifies
>> Also, double this number of profs, associate profs and PE directors are due to retire in the next two years and will also benefit from the move
FLIP SIDE
>> The move could frustrate the ambitions of hundreds of young Goan academicians qualified and keen to take up faculty positions in Goa's colleges
>> In the current academic year alone, over 800 aspiring academicians made a beeline for teaching jobs in the different Colleges of Goa
PANAJI: A proposal to raise from 62 to 65 years the age for retirement on superannuation for professors and associate professors in Goa's under-graduate and post-graduate colleges is in the final stages and could possibly be moved by the government in the ongoing monsoon session for approval.
A top official in the Education ministry held by Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, confirmed the proposal finalised at the bureaucratic level will now require a cabinet nod before it is presented to the House for legislative approval.
The move, according to the Education ministry official, stems from a long-standing recommendation/guideline of the University Grants Commission the autonomous body which governs academic and administrative matters of University education in India. It has itself already raised the retirement age for vice-chancellors of universities to 70.
In Goa, Colleges had been facing a significant shortage of faculty at the senior level which had prompted the late chief minister Manohar Parrikar to initiate the move, the official said, adding that the superannuation age for the faculty in Goa Medical College had already been raised to 65.
Meanwhile, some 20-odd faculty members in Goa's several colleges due to retire this year, are expected to benefit from the move if it fructifies.
Also, double this number of professors, associate professors and physical education directors from colleges are due to retire in the next two years and will also benefit from the move with additional years of active and regular service.
On the flip side, however, the move could frustrate the ambitions of hundreds of young Goan academicians qualified and keen to take up faculty positions in Goa's colleges and extend their wait to land a suitable position.
In the current academic year alone, over 800 aspiring academicians made a beeline for teaching jobs in the different Colleges of Goa offering undergraduate and post-graduate courses.
Sources in the Department of Higher Education said, there were 140 applicants for the few teaching posts in accounting (Commerce) and another 88 aspirants to teach the management subject also in the Commerce Stream.
Tougher science subjects too had applicants competing for a handful of the teaching jobs in colleges by the dozens. In the multiple branches of Chemistry, there were 86 applicants. The three Botany-Zoology-Microbioly branches of Biology had 89 seeking jobs while Physics and Mathematics saw 47 aspiring to teach the subjects this year, the DHE sources said.
Interestingly, despite the teaching jobs coming only in a trickle, there has been a flood of post-graduates seeking to attain the norm set by UGC to be qualified to teach in colleges - NET (National Eligibility Test) conducted by the NTA (National Testing Agency).
On an average 30 from Goa clear the eligibility test conducted by NTA, up from the four to five who used to get through before DHE began conducting training programmes to answer the test in 2018. NTA conducts the eligibility tests twice a year and some 200-plus aspirants have signed up for the training programme this time, the DHE sources said.
Be it as it may, the move to raise retirement age of professors and associate professors is bound to generate debate among academic circles. None-the-less, some will win if and when the Sawant-led government executes it but there will be many for who the wait to join the noble teaching profession could get painfully longer.
