At a time when universities around India are increasingly becoming conscious of the need to upgrade syllabi in order to maintain academic standards, the Delhi University's (DU) School of Open learning (SOl) is still teaching outdated and obsolete syllabus to its students.

Also, while the regular courses in DU run in semester mode with revised syllabus under Choice Based Credit System (CBCS), SOl still adheres to the annual mode.

As a result, lakhs of SOl students are suffering as they are devoid of the opportunity to learn the latest curriculum and upgrade their knowledge accordingly. As a result, they are ill-prepared for the  job market and it also renders them incompatible for higher studies.

Apparently, the SOl is suffering due to the 'apathy' and 'red-tapism' prevalent in the DU's administrative set-up. According to official sources, the proposal for implementing CBCS has already been send to the university authorities after approval by the governing body of SOl last year, but to no avail.

On the other hand, SOl claims to have done all its homework for implementing the CBCS  and is awaiting the nod from the university.

Academic Council member Pankaj Garg informed that syllabus was revised almost 8 years ago when semester system was first introduced, and then at the time of introduction of Four Year Undergraduate program (FYUP) and later on at the time of introducing CBCS in 2015. However, the syllabus/content taught in SOl have not been revised all these years.

Aggravating the situation is the plight of SOl students who can no more migrate on to the regular mode. Earlier students were allowed to migrate from SOl to regular and vice-versa within DU.

SOl sources informed that lying pending with the DU authorities is the proposal of introducing about 10 honors courses in SOl. It is well known that DU's Campus of Open learning provides ample opportunity to those students who cannot make through high cut-offs required in DU, to study the stream and subject of their choice.

DU Vice-Chancellor Yogesh  could not be reached despite several attempts. However, an official on condition of anonymity said that decision making process in DU is moving with a 'snail-pace' and as a result many important decisions are pending.