VC posts: Govt seeks answers from varsities

CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu higher education department has demanded answers from all state universities to a number of contentious questions raised in the past few months. These include appointment of vice-chancellors, regular conduct of syndicate meetings, filling of key posts like registrar and controller of examinations (CoE), and details of agitations carried out by students during the jallikattu protests.

The 14-point proforma was sent to all state-run universities last week. Sources in the department said that the state government is on the back foot during the current assembly session and this exercise has been initiated to avoid embarrassment by an aggressive opposition. The one major issue which the government expects to be raised in the assembly is the absence of VCs in universities like Madurai Kamarajar University (MKU), University of Madras (UNOM) and Anna University.

"Recently, corruption allegations were raised regarding professor appointments in Bharatiar University, delay in payment of December salary of teaching and non-teaching staff of Annamalai University and advertisement for appointment of MKU vice-chancellor. Replies to those issues have also been asked for," a government official said.

Issues raised by TOI in two news reports regarding the Tamil Nadu Open University are there in the proforma. TNOU has been asked to respond on the issue of problems faced by assistant professors which have remained unresolved. The University has also been asked to respond on the cancellation of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with an Ethiopian college, where norms were flouted leading to an e-mail from the Indian embassy in Ethiopia.

All state-run universities also face a challenge with respect to running the Institute of Distance Education (IDE), as the University Grants Commission (UGC) in a circular in September has disallowed courses for all but four institutes in the state. Universities have been asked to respond on what measures have been taken in this regard. "University of Madras has replied that we have obtained a stay order on the circular from Madras high court for the next two academic years," a senior UNOM official said.

The proforma has also asked universities to respond on whether syndicate meetings were being convened at regular intervals and if there were vacancies in syndicate posts. A top official of a Chennai-based university said that syndicate meetings were not being convened at regular intervals in almost every university except Anna University, because of which issues were piling up.