A day after outrage over Gold Medal for 'vegetarians only', the Pune University has decided to scrap the 'Yog Maharshi Shelarmama' gold medal award.
Apart from this award, the administration has also started reviewing conditions given for the eligibility of other 40 awards.
The controversy erupted on Friday after some media reports regarding the condition given to the students that they should be vegetarian and non-alcoholic if they want to apply for the Yog Maharshi Shelarmama gold medal award.
After the media reports, the Vice-Chancellor of the Savitribai Phule Pune University held a meeting with the administration after which the decision of suspending the award was taken. The administration has also withdrawn the circular regarding the award from its website.
Nitin Karmalkar, vice-chancellor of SPPU said, "The award is given in the name of the Maharshi Shelarmama by his family members. He was a disciple of Sant Gadgebaba. Since he belonged to Warkari community, his family members had put the condition for students to be vegetarian. The university has nothing to do with setting these conditions. The award has been constituted since 2006 and every year it has been given."
Karmalkar also admitted that the contentious condition was ignored by the university for all these years.
"At least after the controversy, this issue has come to light and we have decided rectify the conditions. Since, the award is given by the family of Shelarmama, the university requires their approval to remove the condition. We will be meeting the family members asking them to remove the condition. If they do not give permission to remove the condition, we will terminate the award," Karmalkar added.
After the controversy regarding the conditions of the award, now the university is reviewing conditions of other 40 awards constituted by the university which are given by some families or trusts.
Karmalkar said, "University does not believe in any kind of discrimination. In fact, university is the place where we teach students about equality and they are free to consume whatever they feel like consuming."
"We have now decided to review eligibility criteria of 40 other awards constituted by the university. During the review, all such contentious conditions will be removed or these awards will be terminated," Karmalkar added.
Meanwhile, Minister for Higher and Technical Education Vinod Tawde has clarified that even though Savitribai Phule Pune University has issued the circular, the decision was taken in 2006 and it is an old decision.
However, he informed that all the Universities have been conveyed that while selecting a student for any award or scholarship on the basis of conditions put by the donors, there should not be any discrimination and the selection should be in line with the fundamental Constitutional rights of individual.
