The syndicate meeting of the University of Madras was held on Wednesday to discuss in detail the subjects related to the various Boards of Studies. The meeting was chaired by School Education Secretary D. Sabitha as Higher Education Secretary A. Karthik was on leave.
While all the issues on the agenda were taken up, Ms. Sabitha deferred discussion on an ongoing war of letters between a section of the faculty and the registrar. According to a member, the letter was only tabled at the meeting. The dispute pertains to the payment of ₹5 crore to a building contractor. A group of professors alleged that the registrar had not obtained the signatures of all the three members of the convenor committee and paid the contractor to avoid arbitration. The group alleged that since the registrar’s tenure ended on March 6, an inquiry must be instituted.
Some syndicate members said that since the letter-war was not part of the agenda, it was not taken up for discussion.
Another issue was the conduct of an education fair. The secretary, however, said the members should seek an expression of interest and go by procedure.
The members said files had been pending for three to six months and needed to be cleared.
“The secretary asked us to bring all the files and said she would clear it,” a member said. Some members wanted the secretary to ensure due representation in the various sub-committees of the university. “Some of the committees have no representation from the syndicate and so, we wanted her to address this issue,” a member said.
University professors said the lack of a Vice-Chancellor was hurting the functioning of the university. The tenure of the previous Vice-Chancellor R. Thandavan ended on January 17, 2016. “If the V-C is appointed before the registrar’s tenure ends, then the new appointee can be briefed about the events of the past year. Otherwise the next V-C would never know what happened last year,” a professor said.
