NEW DELHI: The HRD Ministry has identified around 80,000 “ghost” teachers in various colleges and universities across the country after the introduction of Aadhaar. Ghost teachers are educators who fail to show up for work, have moved away, or otherwise maintain secure employment in the field.
HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar, however, clarified that none of these teachers are from any central universities.”There are certain ‘ghost’ teachers which use proxy methods and are apparently teaching at multiple places full time. After the introduction of Aadhaar, 80,000 such teachers have been identified and action will be considered against them,” Prakash Javadekar said at an event.
India has about 1.4 million teachers in colleges and universities.The HRD ministry has asked all varsities to seek Aadhaar number from all employees and students to ensure that there is no duplication.
“The ghost teachers have not been identified in any central university but in some state universities and private ones,” Prakash Javadekar said.The survey covers almost all the higher education institutions across the country. Javadekar also launched “Gurujan” a portal for information on teachers.
Aadhaar has already been instrumental in identifying a large number of bogus users the ghosts of various government schemes.
In 2017, Union Ministry of Human Resource Development told colleges and universities across India that they would have to submit Aadhaar numbers of all the teachers.
Public and private education regulatory bodies had been receiving various complaints about fake teachers.
A major parameter of teaching quality in higher education, the teacher-student ratio as of 2015-16 was 1:21, way less than the ideal 1:10. The recent study will only make this ratio plummet even more.
