No new research projects have been sanctioned since the current chairman of ICSSR took charge.
Pending projects that repetitively missed deadlines and over 100 vacant positions have stalled research work at the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) under the HRD Ministry. No new research projects have been sanctioned in the past 11 months since Brij Bihar Kumar, the current chairman of ICSSR, took charge.
"There have been pending projects which missed multiple deadlines for over three years and work has still not been completed. It was important to streamline these as already efforts, manpower and money had been invested," Mr Kumar told PTI in an interview.
"Also out of the 208 positions at the council over 100 of them are vacant including multiple top positions. How can we go on sanctioning new research projects till this is sorted," he asked.
Mr Kumar also pointed out that the functioning of the council was not up to the mark and infrastructural and logistical issues requirements were ignored for long.
Read also: Braj Bihari Kumar To Succeed S K Thorat As ICSSR Chief"There has been repetitive research on certain subjects and the already completed projects have not been updated for years. Research was not being completed in a time-bound manner, so obviously it was not feasible to jump the gun and sanction new projects to meet the same fate," Mr Kumar said.
He, however, is hopeful that by April things will be back on track.
Read also: Riots, Caste Conflicts Should Not Be Part Of School Curriculum: Academic Body ICSSR Chief"Once appointments are over and backlog of pending projects is cleared by April, we will sanction new projects on different subjects of research and seek applications," he said.
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Education News(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)