bhubaneswar dubbing the odisha university amendment bill as draconian and regressive union minister dharmendra pradhan has once again sought the centres intervention to repeal it to ensure autonomy of higher education institutes in the statethe bill also contradicts the nep 2020 he said in a letter to union education minister ramesh pokhriyal nishankpradhan who had opposed the bill and also drawn the attention of pokhriyal to it last month said the anomalous promulgation of the measure has met with nearuniversal criticism from all quarters of odishas academic communityamid protests by the opposition bjp and the congress the odisha assembly on tuesday passed the bill which seeks to abolish senates in universities and restructure syndicates by amending the law governing public varsities in the statethe bill seeks to strip away the autonomy of higher educational institutions in odisha by bureaucratising critical aspects of the functioning of universities and crippling autonomy with the intent of exercising state governments complete dominance the senior bjp leader said in his letterits pernicious provisions to replace senates in universities with the statecontrolled syndicate and manipulate the appointment of vicechancellors by inducting a governmentappointed nominee in the search committees are cause for grave concern he saidthe bill also seeks to unethically bypass the constitutional scrutiny and debates on the utilisation of public funds by withdrawing the tabling of university audit report in the state assembly he saidthis measure has not only been called out for being draconian regressive and incongruous with higher education reforms anywhere in india but also grossly undermines the basic principles of public accountability pradhan saida strong and unanimous view has emerged that the bill should not have been promulgated without prior instructions of the president as per article 213 of the constitution pradhan saideven if the bill is passed by the house it has to be reserved for consideration and assent of the president of india under article 2542 of the constitution the minister saidkeeping in mind the welfare of students scholar faculty and staff the autonomy of higher educational institutions and the overall wellbeing of the higher education ecosystem in odisha and factoring in the blatant inconsistencies of odisha university amendment bill 2020 with the constitution of india i seek your urgent personal intervention in taking necessary action to repeal the bill pradhan said