The state of higher education in India- Who appoints VCs?

Two days back my Uncle sent me a message through Whatsapp asking was it true that Subramanian Swamy was going to appointed the VC of JNU.  My immediate response was that I hope not for JNU would eat him alive.
Of course the news was not true. The MHRD has issued a denial and it has been pointed out that he is anyway 76 years (something that should have stuck me considering one of his daughter is just a year older than me which makes him closer to my parent's age) and that unless the statutes are rewritten, he cannot be appointed VC.
But that is not the point. The point is that it is certain that the VC who will be appointed will be from right-wing.  And everyone is afraid of it.   But what bothers me is that no one dares to point out that if  UPA was in power it was clear that either a left-wing or some one close to Congress will be appointed the VC of the Central Universities. It is always thus.  The Central/State government always handpicks its favorites to head Central/State Universities never mind whether they possess the academic and administrative capabilities.
So my question is: Why does the government interfere into the functioning of an autonomous University?  This interference extends into who will be appointed as teachers, it spills into student politics, finally ending up in ensuring that the University does every thing except academics.  In State Universities is is even worse.  My friend tells me that in her State, there is a price for every post- x amount (running in crores) for VC,  y amount for Professor, z amount for Associate Professor, and so on so forth down the line.  When positions are available for money, why would somebody be bothered to teach?
I have studied in the US and the job of the President of the University was to fundraise and lobby for money.  It is his/her job to ensure that funds flowed in. The President was appointed by the Governing Board and was accountable to them.  The hiring was done by the respective departments based on their requirements. The academics continued irrespective of whether the Republicans were in power or Democrats were in power.
Here the academics is at the mercy of the powers. So if it is Right-wing we will get idiocies like astrology is science and Vedic maths.  If it is Left-wing we will get the exact opposite. But rest assured, that the academics will never be free from the color of the politics.

The state of higher education in India- What is the value of a Ph.D.

The headlines making rounds is that 250 Ph.D degree holders are applying for a peon's job in UP.  Of course there is lot of head-beating bout lack of jobs etc.  My take is little different. I am not denying that jobs are difficult to get after Ph.D. Academic jobs are few and you need really good papers to get a post-doctoral position.  A big debate is going on in the US on this issue.
That said, I would also say that majority of the Ph.D. degree holders in India are unemployable.  Ph.D. has become some thing to do while waiting for a job.  The fellowships, at least in Science, is more than enough to survive (considering that most will stay in a hostel for peanuts and have only mess bills as their major expenditure and that they do not have to pay any income tax).  So after M.Sc. students are now drifting into Ph.D with no thought as to why they are doing it. In fact I will be brutally honest and say that of all the student who have graduated from my lab only two really deserved it and one student should have been thrown out.  However, the system is such that I have no powers whatsoever to throw a student out if he/she fails to perform.  The fault, of course, rests with the faculty as much as it does with the student. In the doctoral committee meeting, this time, there were two really bad presentations and it was very obvious that the student had not read. However, the supervisor for one of the students was scared to tell the student to present again even though I said I would support him. In case of the other student, I put my foot down, and said that the student will have to present again (it is a different matter that I had to then work with this student, in absence of his supervisor, and improve his presentation).  The student still did not read anything and I doubt if he is going to be working hard, but at least hopefully, he got the message that it will not be a cakewalk next time.
As one of my colleague points out, many of the faculties themselves have no academic rigor (other things like walking the dog, taking of the children and the home, taking care of their car etc take precedence over academic matters) that they have no authority whatsoever to tell the student to get lost if they do not perform.
As far as the students are concerned I seriously think that many of them do not even understand what Ph.D. is. As far as they are concerned it is just another degree that should be given to them at the end of five years.  When the students were agitating for increased fellowship, a senior colleague bemoaned that the students are demanding money but they do not demand academic rigor, better lab facilities, better access to journals...things that would improve their academic standard.  They do not care.
I have talked only about a premier Central University. Multiply the woes by about million times, in case of State Universities, and you will get to the situation where 250 Ph.D holders in UP are applying for a peon's job.

How to ensure safety of students- the UGC way

The UGC apparently is much concerned about the safety of students on campuses across the country. So they have come up with a guideline to ensure just that as they believe "a safe, secure and cohesive learning climate is an ineluctable precondition to quality education and research."  Therefore, they have asked
1. Physical infrastructure housing students should be secured by a boundary wall so high that it cannot be scaled and fortified further by barbed wires.
2. Setting up police station within the premises of the higher education institutes.
3.The institutes should organize quarterly parent-teacher meeting.
4. A student counselling system has to be put in place with teacher counsellers who will periodically communicate to the parents the intellectual and emotive needs of their wards. Teacher counselors can coordinate with the hostel warden and exchange personal details of the students.

There is many more but these points are the most problematic. First, the good point is of course they have not said that only the girls hostels should be secured by a boundary wall. It is both- men and women- who have to be secured. The problem is that this gives an impression of a prison which an educational institute is definitely not. Most campuses have a boundary wall and most of them have rules and regulations as to who is allowed into the campus.  The campus security to a large extent takes care of it.  In a campus like JNU where students are allowed to move freely it is largely because it is safe.  Even in M.S. University, where there were strict timings as to when we should return to the hostel (we girls hardly ever did that), the campus was safe enough for us to go from the department to the hostel at 9 in the night.  Having a boundary wall does not solve security issues neither does having a police station.
Parent-Teacher meetings?  For heaven's sake, the students in Universities and colleges are adults! They are not children where the teacher has to meet and appraise them of their activities.  
As for the section on counseling, has the UGC heard of confidentiality?

I do not what UGC is thinking but these guidelines are ridiculous. They have to understand that the students are attending colleges and Universities are adults. You can provide counseling services, grievance redress mechanisms, campus security (for example, the UGC has asked for night drop service which is a very nice idea) but beyond it there is not much that a University/college can do without seeming to be a prison.

And the crows ate them all

Today morning when I opened the balcony and peeped into the dove nest, I noticed only one nestling.  I wondered what had happened to the other one.  The answer came when I was watering my garden.  A crow swooped down, grabbed the chick by the neck, and flew away.  All I could see was the tiny brown thing hanging helplessly from the crow's beak.  I guess that is life.
The nest is empty.  The parent had fed the chick in the morning and gone away possibly to get more food. I wonder whether they will return.

Oats idli and Tomato chutney (also the dove eggs have hatched)

Ever since I discovered how to make oats idli, it has become my favourite.   It is easy to make and healthy, though my brother seemed amazed that there is something called oats idli and my father made a snarky remark that idlis seemed to be made nowdays of everything but rice and dal.  I also learnt to make tomato chutney one day in desperation when I discovered that the idli podi was over and my mother was in Chennai and I can get the podi only in December (It is a different story that I finally made the podi myself after asking my mother for the recipe and making sense of her instructions.  I think I added tad too much sesame seeds but my cousin's wife, who is visiting me, appreciated it very much).  So I trawled through the net and experimented with various recipes before settling down to make it with onions, tomatoes, and coconut milk (and no garlic).  I made them today for my visiting cousin's wife and she appreciated it very much.
The dove eggs hatched on Thursday and the mother (or the father? The sexes look identical in case of laughing doves) is busy nursing them. 

Today she (or he) has left them alone for couple of hours. When she (or he) returned there was an orgy of frenzied feeding.

The parent has gone off again to scrounge for food and so it continues. The nest which seemed perfect for two eggs and one adult dove is becoming increasingly smaller with the two growing chicks and one nursing parent.
The dove parent has become quite tolerant of me.  Initially, it showed a tendency to fly off but after I sealed the balcony and left it strictly alone, it has sort of accepted me. At least the bird is quite okay when I go close to take a peek at the babies or water the ferns.  But if the pigeon, their upstairs neighbour, dares to approach anywhere near the parent flies into a rage.