Kathmandu, April 8 More than 1,000 colleges affiliated to Tribhuvan University have been running classes with temporary affiliation because of the varsity’s failure to monitor such colleges. Currently, a total of 1,084 private and public colleges are affiliated to TU. While some of the colleges are new, many are over three decades old. The university, however, has ignored the colleges’ contribution and done nothing for them, except conducting exams and distributing certificates. Dambar Hamal, campus chief at Madan Bhandari Memorial College, said the college had to pay a huge amount to TU every year to renew its affiliation, but the college gets nothing in return. Madan Bhandari college was established in 2001 with temporary affiliation to TU. “We have to pay anything from Rs 30,000 to Rs 50,000 as renewal charge per faculty and per subject. Similarly, we have to give one-month fee of every student as service charge to the university. However, we are getting nothing in return,” said Hamal. “The university doesn’t even monitor the campus to check its academic quality and infrastructure development. Nor does it provide external invigilators during exams,” complained Hamal, stating that affiliation and subject approval facilities were only given to colleges with political connections or those with links to TU officials. He said the college had filled the form for permanent affiliation last year, but there was no reply from TU. Dr Din Bandhu Sharma, campus chief at Namuna Machhindra College, also shared similar woes. “In return for the affiliation charge and service charge we pay to the university, we get nothing, except certificates awarded to students. Despite complaints, we have faith in TU, so we want the varsity to regularly monitor our activities and support us,” he added. Namuna Machhindra was established in 1980 and has yet to get permanent affiliation. After Vice Chancellor Tirtha Raj Khaniya took charge of TU, he formed a nine-member committee under the coordination of Prof Prahlad Raj Pant to draft a policy regarding affiliation to colleges. The committee has already prepared the draft of the policy and is currently taking feedback from various stakeholders. It states that the respective dean’s offices were active while granting affiliation to private colleges while the planning division was confined to facilitation only, lacking necessary data related to affiliated colleges. \Likewise, it says various subjects under the Faculty of Education, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences and Faculty of Management were popular in TU affiliated colleges. The draft further reads that colleges were given affiliation not on the basis of geography and students’ population, but on the basis of political pressure and local demand. As a result, the campuses under the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences are on the verge of closure while campuses under Faculty of Management are rare in the rural areas.