Chennai: Governor R N Ravi threw down yet another gauntlet to the State government on Wednesday by cancelling the search committee constituted by the State Higher Education Department to find the next Vice-Chancellor for the Annamalai University in Chidambaram and announcing his committee for the purpose.
The search committee notified by the Higher Education Department through a Government Order on December 9 ‘purposefully’ excluded the UGC Chairman’s nominee, in violation of the judgments of the Supreme Court, a press release from Raj Bhavan said.
‘The Hon’ble Governor, as the Chancellor of Annamalai University, Chidambaram, has constituted the Search Committee for identification of the candidate for appointment as Vice-Chancellor of the University,’ the press release said and added that Ravi had directed the State government to notify the search committee formed by him.
The search committee formed by the Governor included nominees of the Chancellor, Government of Tamil Nadu, Syndicate of the University and UGC Chairman, as per the provisions of the Annamalai University Act and as per prevailing regulations of UGC, 2018, the release said.
The UGC regulations had been held to be mandatory by the Supreme Court and the search committee formed by the Governor consisted of the above four members with the Chancellor’s nominee as Convener, it said.
Since the search committee constituted without following the provisions of the UGC Regulations should be void ab initio, the notification issued by the Government on that should be recalled and the committee constituted by the Governor should be notified, the release said.
‘The Hon’ble Supreme Court of India has already held in the case of Prof. (Dr) Sreejith P.S. Vs. Dr.Rajasree M.S. & Others (Civil Appeal numbers 7634-7635 of 2022, SLP(c) Nos, 21108-21109 of 2021) that any appointment as a Vice Chancellor made on the recommendation of the Search Committee, which is constituted contrary to the provisions of the UGC Regulations shall be void ab initio,' the Raj Bhavan said.
The spat between the Governor and the State government over the appointment of Vice Chancellors for the State universities, which has left four other universities headless, and a wide range of other issues is as old as Ravi taking over in September 2021.
When the State Cabinet was reshuffled some time back and Kovi Chezhian was brought in as Minister for Higher Education, replacing K Ponmudi, many stakeholders in the education department expressed a hope that the relationship between the government and Raj Bhavan could improve but that had not changed with Ravi digging in his heels on including the UGC chairman’s nominee in the search committees.
