Report of the Peer Team on
The Ramnarain Ruia College, Matunga, Mumbai was established in 1937 with the explicit aim of promoting education and making it easily accessible to all sections of society in Maharashtra. It was the first college in Mumbai to be started by a private society Sikshan Prasarak Mandali, Pune.
Before independence its aim was to provide notional education but after the independence the aim changed to providing useful and affordable education to all. Today after more than 60 years this college offers 2 Undergraduate, 2 Postgraduate Diplomas, 5 Postgraduate, 3 Ph.D. programmes – in all 13 programmes – in 8 science and 10 arts departments. It has a permanent faculty of 82 of which 33 (40%) have Ph.D., 17 (21%) have M.Phil., and 32 (39%) have PG. Out of 17 temporary teachers 4 have Ph.D. 13 PG degrees. Its administrative staff strength is 104. The total student enrolment is 2331 - the Diplomas 21, Under Graduate 2081, Postgraduate Diplomas 77, Postgraduate 129 and Ph.D. 23.
The Peer Team consisting of Prof. Bhoomitra Dev, Formerly Vice-Chancellor, Rohilkhand University, Lucknow (Chairman); Rev. Fr. Francis Parmar SJ, Principal St. Xavier’s College, Ahmedabad and Prof. P. Pramada Devi, Principal, University College for Women, Hyderabad (members) visited the college from September 07 – 09, 1999 to assess the institution for accreditation primarily on the basis of the Self-study Report submitted by the College. The team was accompanied by Dr. Antony Stella, Deputy Adviser, NAAC. The team had extensive interactions with the Principal, faculty and representatives of the Management, staff, students, parents and alumni and the team went through a number of relevant documents. The following report is based on all these factors.
Section 2: Criterion-wise Analysis
Criterion I: Curricular Aspects
The College offers undergraduate programmes mainly. Postgraduate courses are offered by 4 departments. The Ph.D. and M.Sc. programmes in Chemistry are highly commendable and those in Zoology too are commendable. Microbiology is another department which keeps abreast of time in curriculum content and it meets student needs. M.Sc. by research offered by the college is a step in the right direction. The College offers a fairly wide range of programme options.
The rapport with industry which of the science departments have successfully maintained and the introduction of job oriented courses, are noteworthy. The Therapeutic Drug Monitoring Laboratory (TDM) is a useful facility to update curriculum.
The College has started education in Marathi medium to realise its goal to make higher education easily accessible to all sections of society.
While obliged to remain within the affiliating system, a couple of departments have been quite innovative in their approach to education and research.
Feedback mechanisms as well as more interaction with academic peers and employees are desirable.
Criterion II: Teaching-learning and Evaluation
The College offers remedial courses to students who cannot cope with their studies. The College has gone out of its way to conduct 6 refresher courses. This is a welcome step. Outstanding teachers and students are given recognition through awards. Faculty members are encouraged to participate in seminars. Some of them have been sent abroad. Teachers from the departments of economics, history and Marathi teach at the postgraduate level.
The audio-visual equipment available to the entire college community is satisfactory. It has been found to facilitate the use of educational technology to supplement the conventional methods of teaching.
The establishment of the exam cell and the efforts of the institution to monitor the progress of the students, wherever possible, are appreciated. The college will do even better if it works out a mechanism for evaluating teaching and research; as well as monitoring work satisfaction.
Applications for admission and the availability of seats are equal in a number of departments, minimizing choice of selection, based on knowledge and aptitude. The College obviously follows university regulations in its admission policy.
The College has asked for autonomy which hopefully will help to promote innovation in all departments in the future.
Criterion III: Research, Consultancy and Extension
Ten faculty (12%) members are involved in research. TDM laboratory, though an independent institution, is very closely related to the college. The College staff are involved in consultancy through this body and TDM in return contributes financially to enhance the college facilities. It is an excellent facility for research for both staff and students.
The publications of a few faculty members are appreciated. The creative writings especially the work of the department of Hindi is noteworthy.
Though some of the departments are certainly keeping abreast of times and contributing through research and consultancy, like the departments of Chemistry, Micro-biology, Zoology, and History, majority of the departments need to do more research work. The College needs to work out ways and means to spread research culture in the arts faculty as a whole.
Departments like Life Sciences practise inter-disciplinary curricular arrangements.
The College has had a very good rural development programme leading to the establishment of Nirmiti Youth Foundation. Now that the village adopted earlier is practically on its own, the college plans to adopt a new village. This work is well appreciated. Students of the college also help the neighbouring slum dwellers.
Criterion IV: Infrastructure and Learning Resources
The College has a very good central library with nearly one lakh of volumes. The library facilities are being computerised. Some of the departments also have modestly stocked libraries. Though the number of books in the central library is satisfactory, subscription to journals may be increased. A few departments have computers. Extending these facilities to all the departments and subscribing to periodicals for departmental libraries may help.
The college has got excellent facilities for visually challenged students. Robotron to read for the students, computer to translate as well as give printouts of Braille into English and a computer to talk to these visually challenged students are great assets. These facilities are made available to visually handicapped students from other colleges as well. The college is highly commended for realising its goal of making education easily accessible to all, in a very special way to the visually challenged persons.
The college also has adequate sports facilities. Though the sports facilities are adequate, participation may be increased.
The NAAC process seems to have helped the college to establish a grievance redressal cell. The college has also hostel facilities for a few resident students. Addition of a new reading hall is appreciated. There is a special reading hall for girl students with a canteen close by. The college has creatively added mezzanine floor, utilising the high ceiling of the old building.
Criterion V: Student Support and Progression
Progression to further studies and employment is satisfactory. Collaboration with industry in and through TDM brings the institution, staff and students in direct contact with industry providing an excellent opportunity for students to move into the industrial sector for jobs.
The college provides personal counselling on weekly basis to a few students. The college keeps in touch with old students through alumni association. However, it may help if it is a registered society.
The career fare and booklets giving information about job opportunities and training are commendable. The student support and progression would be greatly helped if there was a formal student feedback system.
There are no foreign students in the college but there are a few students from outside the state of Maharashtra.
Criterion VI: Organisation and Management
The college has got a 3 tier system of Management – local management council with representatives of all the sections of the college community, administrative council comprising the heads of institutions and the General Council. The Management seems to be giving enough freedom to the local persons to innovate and sensitize their services to local needs. Establishing TDM to give industrial exposure to the staff and students is appreciated.
Almost 30% of the administrative staff has been helped to attain computer literacy. The Principal has succeeded in getting whole hearted co-operation from the whole college community through his cordial person oriented approach of the Management. This has resulted in the smooth functioning of the various departments and administrative wings of the college.
The mechanism for performance appraisal would be a great help. The college has also planned to give financial assistance to both faculty and the staff specially for the education of their children.
Criterion VII: Healthy Practices
The career fare held for all Mumbai colleges and its booklets are timely service to the student body.
The TDM provides the much-required funds in and through a service specific to an institution of higher learning.
Vidyarthi Prathinithi Mandal for cultural activities combines a healthy mix of selection and election. Willing students from among the talented students are selected, who in turn elect their leader.
The College not only caters for the needs of 35 visually challenged students but provides state of the art equipment for them.
Student Mutual Aid Fund is another help to realise its goal of making higher education available to all. Fire fighting and first aid training sessions organised for the College community are appreciated. The College plans to introduce “earn while you learn” scheme for the poor students. There is also a plan to have one faculty guide for every 10 to 15 students.
The Ruia College, Matunga, Mumbai is a grant-in-aid institution affiliated to the University of Mumbai. During the last 62 years of its existence it has helped to spread higher education among all classes in Maharashtra. The College is highly commended for the research culture and high academic standards maintained in its Chemistry department. It is also renders yeomen service to the visually challenged students. Its career fare is an event to look forward to by all Mumbai Colleges.
While commending the college for its healthy practices and contributions to higher education, we the members of the Peer Team would like to offer the following suggestions for further growth and development of this fine institution.
· The research culture, evident in Chemistry and in some other science departments such as Microbiology and Zoology, needs to spread further to other departments.
· A critical attitude needs to be developed more among faculty, staff and students in order to keep abreast of times.
· Organised faculty performance appraisal is recommended.
· Though from the point of view of absolute numbers, the library facilitates are found to be satisfactory, new additions to the library need to be more.
· Subscription to the journals needs to be increased.
Inspite of being within an affiliated system, the college has been innovative and deeply concerned about the future of higher education in the state of Maharashtra. Considerable credit goes to the TDM for updated patronage; co-operation of teachers and employees as also the active involvement of the students under the dynamic leadership of the Principal.
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