Law colleges face staff crunch

Government Law College has four full-time teachers for 1,602 students

It’s not just the Government Law College which is facing a shortage of full-time faculty; other state-aided colleges in the city too have a similar problem.

For over a decade now, these colleges have only three full-time teachers. The state government sanctions only three posts for full-time faculty, in addition to the principal’s and the librarian’s posts.

GLC has four full-time teachers for 1,602 students, while KC Law College, Churchgate, has three for 800 students. “The student-teacher ratio is supposed to be 40:1. We have one teacher for more than 250 students. Though we get contract and part-time teachers, they are paid peanuts,” said Nilima Chandiramani, principal KC College. Teachers on clock-hour basis are paid only Rs100 per hour.

While GLC has 34 part-time teachers on clock-hour basis, KC on average has 30. “The number of posts sanctioned needs to be increased. Nobody will want to take up a job on contract when he or she can earn lakhs practicing law,” Chandiramani said.

AK Inamdar, the principal in-charge of Siddharth College of Law said that the college approximately needs 17 full-time teachers.

Daisy Alexander, principal of Rizvi Law College, an unaided college, said such colleges did not face problems as the government sanction did not apply to them. However, hiring good teachers was still a problem due to the qualifications required and meager salaries. Alexander said, “Unaided colleges in cities like Pune charge a high fee, hence they can afford to pay higher salaries.

A private college in Pune charges its students Rs57,000 per annum as fees, while Rizwi charges only Rs8,000 per year.”