Hyderabad: Maulana Azad National Urdu University in Gachibowli is almost locked down for the last couple of days.
“There are no students as most of them have gone their homes away from Hyderabad. The teaching and non-teaching staff have been asked to stay at their homes. The only staff that are seen working on the campus are from the administration,” a source at the university said.
The source said this past Saturday, the Ministry of Human Resources and Development’ Higher Education and Literacy Department gave permission to teaching and non-teaching staff to work from home.
The notice orders higher-learning institutions to let teachers, researchers and non-teaching staff to work from home till March 31. As of March 21, the former two were asked to develop on-line content, on-line teaching and on-line methods of evaluation.
From a distance, they were asked to carry on their duties of teaching and research. The remainder of this period shall be counted as being on duty for staff whose contracts are valid at least up to March 31, 2020.
The source said, “Only the finance and medical departments are open. With many students from the other than Hyderabad who were not able to go home are still on campus.”
For them, the mess is open.
A student stated, “Even during the class, we did get our documents and readings via Google Docs, but it is easier to gauge if a student has read the material only in a physical classroom — which are empty due to containment efforts —rather than an online one.”