Great news: AICTE sets up online grievance cell for engineers across the country

 Soon, the students and the faculty members of around 10,000 engineering colleges in the country will be able to register their complaints and grievances online. The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), which regulates technical education in the country, has asked all the institutions, affiliated to it, "to urgently put in place an online mechanism, if not presently existing, for registering and disposing of grievances".

According to a recent AICTE directive, the HRD Ministry has stressed the need to have a mechanism for online registration as well as disposal of the grievances not only of the students but also of the faculty members and the other stakeholders. The effectiveness of the online grievance redressal system will be a factor at the time of granting of the annual approval to an institution by the AICTE. 

"Every institution should be able to receive and dispose off the grievances online," said the missive, signed by AICTE chief Anil Sahasrabudhe and addressed to the heads of all the AICTE-approved technical institutions.
As per directive, each of these institutions will have to put up a notice board or flex board fixed near the office of the Head, giving details of the online grievance redressal mechanism like its URL, names, contact numbers and e-mail addresses of members of the Grievance committee etc.
"An online monthly status report regarding the number of the grievances received, disposed off and pending should be informed to AICTE," the regulator has said.

"Non-registration of grievances on the institution's portal results in more numbers being registered on the central government's pg. portal, which would be an indication that the grievance redressal mechanism of the respective institution or organisation is not working properly to the satisfaction of the petitioners," the AICTE said.

The Council will take into account the performance of the grievance redressal mechanism at the time of renewal of their permission or approval every year, it added. There are over 10,000 AICTE-approved technical institutions in the country. The need to create an effective grievance redressal mechanism was also discussed by the one-member Justice A K Roopanwal commission set up by the HRD ministry after the death of Hyderabad Central University student Rohith Vemula last year.