ABSTRACT
The philanthropic motive to establish private colleges before independence and in the immediate post-independence phase no longer survives today. In the 1970s, there was a growing demand for the government takeover of private colleges. The various centers of power acted upon state run by political actors and the bureaucrats. They also worked upon the university administration. The pulls and pressures of different centers of power fulfilled the demands of certain sections of society through the takeover of colleges and giving security of tenure to teachers and non-teaching employees. In the midst of the conflict between various groups, there was complete defiance of the rationalities implicit in the rules and regulations. Hence, in the management of private colleges, rationalities failed to prevail amidst various oppositions, with a heavy price for governance and the quality of teaching and learning.
