UGC ‘NET’: A Critique

Abstract

UGC NET devised for the recruitment of teachers in higher education has been in the news in recent months and has faced stiff opposition, particularly from prospective researchers and teachers. A test of this kind has a very strong washback effect on all aspects of education including future teachers and their teaching. Bad recruitment testing produces bad teachers and leads to bad teaching while good testing exerts a corrective influence on bad teaching and is supportive of good teaching and good teachers. Since such a test is so important, this article looks at the sample questions of papers I, and papers II and III (concerning English Literature) of this test to examine its suitability as an eligibility test for the recruitment of teachers to see whether NET in its present form is conducive to improving the quality of teachers and their teaching so badly needed in many of our institutes of higher education.