In what is seen as a diversion from the convention, by ignoring the names recommended by Madurai Kamaraj University, the Governor-Chancellor’s office has nominated 10 members to the seats in university’s Senate that had been lying vacant for several months.
As per MKU’s statute, 10 members of the Senate have to be nominees of the Governor-Chancellor of the university, of which five must be from Scheduled Caste / Scheduled Tribe communities.
In a letter sent in December 2017 by the office of former Vice-Chancellor P.P. Chellathurai, whose appointment was set aside recently by Madras High Court, a list of 20 names in the ratio of 1:2 to fill the 10 vacancies were recommended to the Governor’s office.
Senior faculty members in the university said that the Governor’s office generally chose 10 names from the list of 20 sent by the university. “Of the 20 names recommended by the university, 10 will be from open category and 10 from SC / ST categories. The Governor’s office generally chose five from each category,” Head of one of the departments of MKU and a Senate member said.
However, he pointed out, not a single name from the list sent by MKU in December 2017 was chosen by the Governor’s office.
Importantly, the recommendations sent by MKU included V. Murugan, the Assistant Professor in the Department of Management Studies, who is lodged in prison in connection with the audiotape scandal that broke out in April. It can be recollected that the university administration distanced itself from Murugan and projected him as an ordinary staff member when his name surfaced in the case.
The scandal involved Nirmala Devi, an Assistant Professor of Devanga Arts College in Virudhunagar district, attempting to lure four girls from her college into doing sexual favours at the behest of some university officials in return for academic and financial assistance. Along with Nirmala Devi, Murugan, and V. Karuppasamy, a former research scholar of the university, were arrested in the case. The trial is expected to commence soon.
The other names
The other names recommended by MKU included A. Selvaraj, the chief executive officer of Jeyarekha Industries in Madurai, who was appointed last year as advisor to MKU on University-Industry collaboration, and ‘Solai’ M. Raja, the vice-president of Tamil Nadu Olympics Association and an AIADMK functionary.
Welcoming the move, a section of academicians has also demanded the filling of other elected vacancies in the Senate and Syndicate that are lying vacant for long.
