Why in news? The Karnataka state department of Higher Education has rejected a proposal to set up a tribal university .

Highlights

• The Department of Kannada and Culture had proposed the tribal university in order to encourage further studies and research on tribal communities.
• The Karnataka State Higher Education Council (KSHEC) rejected the proposal at its general body meeting.
• Council decided to offer courses or subjects related to tribals at the existing Janapada (Folklore) University.
• Idea of starting a tribal university: On recommendations by a Cabinet sub-committee.

Expert committee Recommendation

• An expert committee head: Dr R Balasubramaniam( founder of Swami Vivekananda Youth Movement)
• Purpose : Study for the purpose of establishing tribal university
• The following recommendations
• There was no need for a separate university.
• Recommended a study chair constituted in any of the existing universities
• Pointed the reservation in education for the tribal community and a tribal community study centre were already functional at the Kuvempu University

Other reasons from committee

• Karnataka has a tribal (STs) population of 42,48,987, according to the All India Survey for Higher Education report for 2018-19.
• The total number of students belonging to this community is around 1.5 lakh and pointed out unnecessity in  set up a separate university for this number
• The Janapada University will be instructed to offer courses tribal courses from the next academic year

Karnataka Folklore University

• It also known as Karnataka Jaanapada Vishwavidyalaya,
• Nature: Public university
• Vision : Exclusively dedicated to the study and research of folklore.
• Location : Shiggaon, Haveri
• Vice-Chancellor:D.B.Naik
• The university is claimed to be world’s first university for folklore inaugurated by the then Chief Minister of Karnataka D. V. Sadananda Gowda.
• The university offers degrees M.A. in various fields were well MBA, MPhil and PhD