The University Grants Commission (UGC), established in November 1956 as a statutory body of the Government of India through an Act of Parliament, has the unique distinction of being the only grant giving agency in the country which has been vested with two responsibilities that of providing funds and that of coordination, determination and maintenance of standards in institutions of higher education. To monitor standards of the higher educational institutions the UGC has established the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) as an autonomous body, under section 12(ccc) of its Act in September 1994. NAAC has been instilling a momentum of quality consciousness amongst Higher Educational Institutions, aiming for continuous improvement. However, lasting improvements in standards cannot come about only by accreditation from outside, once in five years. An internal mechanism for sustenance, assurance and enhancement of the quality culture of education imparted by them, therefore, become essential. Many HEIs already have established the Internal Quality Assurance Cell (IQAC) as a post accreditation quality sustenance activity. Recognizing the importance of such institutional internal quality system the UGC has taken a policy decision to direct all colleges to establish IQAC for which it has decided to provide seed financial assistance
The IQAC shall have the following function
- Development and application of quality benchmarks/parameters for the various academic and administrative activities of the Colleges;
- Facilitating the creation of a learner-centric environment conducive for quality education and faculty maturation to adopt the required knowledge and technology for participatory teaching and learning process;
- Arrangement for feedback responses from students, parents and other stakeholders on qualityrelated institutional processes;
- Dissemination of information on the various quality parameters of higher education;
- Organization of inter and intra institutional workshops, seminars on quality related themes and promotion of quality circles;
- Documentation of the various programmes/activities of the College, leading to quality improvement;
- Acting as a nodal agency of the college for coordinating quality-related activities, including adoption and dissemination of good practices
- Development and maintenance of institutional database through MIS for the purpose of maintaining / enhancing the institutional quality;
- Development of the Annual Quality Assurance Report (AQAR) of the College based on the quality parameters/assessment criteria developed by the relevant quality assurance body (like NAAC, NBA, AB) in the prescribed format;
- Bi-annual development of Quality Radars (QRs) and Ranking of Integral Unites of Colleges based on the AQAR;
- Interaction with SQACs in the pre and post accreditation quality assessment, sustenance and enhancement endeavours.