Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar Bihar University, Muzaffarpur, is mulling to introduce semester system for its degree courses after the University Grants Commission threatened to hold back its annual funding.

A letter signed by the panel’s secretary, Akhilesh Gupta, was sent to the university officials on July 23. The vice-chancellor, registrar and development officer have been asked to evolve ways to implement the semester system in degree courses at the earliest. The UGC secretary has asked the university officials to accomplish the task in a year.

There are 39 constituent colleges and 25 affiliated colleges under the university where degree courses are run. The semester system was introduced in postgraduate courses in 2011 at the behest of the UGC.

The letter signed by Gupta has threatened to stop UGC’s annual grant to colleges under the university if it failed to introduce the semester system. The grant provided by the panel is used for developing and boosting the institutions’ infrastructure.

When contacted, development officer of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar Bihar University Kalyan Kumar Jha said: “The university is considering to introduce semester system in the degree courses. Vice-chancellor Ravi Verma has directed the concerned officials to discuss the issue with examination board members. A meeting has been scheduled for mid-August.”

The UGC letter deplored the university’s lack of interest to introduce semester system in degree courses. Earlier, the panel had sent several letters to the varsity for considering the introduction of semester system in the interest of the students. But the university preferred to keep mum, rather than informing the UGC about its helplessness and difficulties in introducing the new system.

With the introduction of the semester system in degree courses, delayed start to the academic sessions would be checked.

This time, the UGC secretary has directed varsity officials to inform of their intention at the earliest in the wake of the latest instruction.

The UGC has also made it clear to the university that they need to overhaul its examination system for the degree and postgraduate courses.

It has called for an online system for submission of examination forms as well as publication of results.

Gupta has said in the letter: “It is a sad commentary on the part of the university as it still takes at least six months in publication of results.”

He added: “Even worse, majority of the students run from pillar to post to rectify their results, as the results published by the university is filled with anomalies.”