The English Press Club sat down with Kunj Doshi, the Student Senator of BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus, to gain some insight into his work and to seek clarification on the attendance policy.

He began by explaining the structure and responsibilities of the Senate. He stated that the Senate was responsible for administrative policies related to academics, discipline, student welfare and the general functioning of the institute. He mentioned that the Student Senators served as the voice of the GBM in the Senate.

Kunj revealed that in addition to the Student Senators, the Senate consisted of faculty members, all of the Deans, a Chairman, a Secretary and a Head of Senate. He said that the Chairman and the Secretary of the Senate are usually the Vice Chancellor and the Registrar respectively. The Secretary is responsible for organising Senate meetings, sending invitations and creating agendas. He mentioned that the position of the Head of Senate changed each tenure and was last held by Dr. Sudhir Kumar Barai, the previous director. He further explained that the Senate consisted of three Student Senators from each of the four BITS campuses – one each from the First Degree Programme, the Higher Degree Programme, and the Doctoral Programme respectively.

When asked about how he made sure to take different student perspectives into account, Kunj disclosed that the Senators were sent a list of agendas which was to be discussed a few days before the meeting. He revealed that the Student Senators had a WhatsApp group where they discussed any policy which they considered ‘controversial’ beforehand. He added that he also took inputs from the Student Academic Cell. He stated that if there ever arose a situation where he did not have necessary inputs to come to a conclusion, he would approach the President or the General Secretary of the Students’ Union to roll out an opinion form to collect responses from the GBM.

Talking about new policies being implemented by the Senate, Kunj stated that three new programs were being introduced. These included an M.Sc. degree in Semiconductors and Nanotechnology, which will be available in the three Indian campuses. Additionally, two new degrees- B.Sc. Environmental and Sustainability Engineering and B.Sc. Biomedical Engineering will be introduced for both PCM and PCB students. He added that while the M.Sc. degree will be a new addition, the two B.Sc. degrees will be added at the expense of seats from other B.E. degrees which had a lower cutoff in BITSAT.¹

Moving on to the attendance policy, he explained that Clause 4.23 of the Academic Regulations of BITS Pilani stated that the Instructor-in-Charge (IC) was responsible for maintaining attendance records. He added that Clause 1.17 said that regulations do not stipulate a minimum percentage of attendance for a student to be eligible to appear for any examination, which is widely famous as the ‘0% attendance policy.’ He clarified that no changes had been made to any of these existing policies and the biometric devices had been installed to enforce clause 4.23 by creating a formalized way to record attendance. He assured that there will never be a day when the attendance will be enforced.

He admitted that he and the other Senators had concerns that the attendance data might be used by professors when handing out grades. He shared concerns that even if attendance did not directly affect grading, there might be bias in favour of students who regularly attend classes, thus indirectly affecting the grades of other students. He agreed that students currently have the flexibility to attend any section of lectures they want, which might change if attendance is recorded. He revealed that he had mailed his concerns and suggestions to the Vice Chancellor and was yet to receive a reply at the time of the interview. He divulged that he had also talked to the Chief Warden and the Associate Dean, SWD regarding this and they agreed that attendance should not affect grading or be used to enforce. He added that the Vice Chancellor will have an open meeting in Goa soon, and if their concerns were not addressed with satisfactory answers, a meeting would be conducted including the Student Senators and the SU members from all the campuses to discuss further steps.

He revealed that only AUGSD had access to the attendance data. Kunj said that eventually this data would be released to parents as well, the logistics of which were yet to be decided² .He assured that he had a proposal with responses to all the arguments made by the Vice Chancellor as well as suggestions, and he would try his best to reach a middle ground. He stated that they had recommended that this data should be made available only at parents’ request*. He reasoned by saying that this data should not be shared without the student’s consent, and students should not be compulsorily held accountable to their parents.

He added that he had read more than hundred Google Sheet responses of the GBM’s concerns, and had quite a few recommendations and ideas to pitch to the administration. He assured that he would raise the GBM’s concerns to the Vice Chancellor as soon as possible. Kunj concluded by urging the GBM to not believe in any rumours and wait for formal communication from the institute. 

1. The Student Senator informs us that as per the latest updates, the B.Sc. in Environmental and Sustainability Engineering has been changed to a B.E. degree, though it will still be available to both PCM and PCB students. The B.Sc. in Biomedical Engineering has been put on hold for now. ↩︎
2. In the Goa Open House Meet, the Vice Chancellor has disclosed that the attendance record will be available to parents on the ERP Portal. ↩︎