A recent Government Order issued by the Higher Education Department mandating teachers working in government and aided colleges to obtain permission to contest the elections to university bodies such as the Syndicate, Senate and Academic Council has triggered a controversy.
The order dated July 15 states that the mandate was necessitated “to bring back academic ambience in the colleges and ensure discipline is maintained”.
‘Revoke order’
Teachers’ bodies have demanded that the order be revoked immediately as it infringed on their constitutional rights. “It is teachers like us who ask questions at the university meetings. Self-financing colleges do send their representatives but they never raise issues as questioning the affiliating body could harm their existence,” said N. Pasupathy, general secretary of Association of University Teachers.
“Teachers go to Syndicate, Senate and Academic Council for the benefit of students. The State government has framed the rules and statutes for the University Act. This order makes a mockery of the statues and questions the very basis of the Act,” he added.
Professor C.R. Ravi, former principal of the A.M. Jain College, pointed out that the G.O. conspicuously excluded teachers of self-financing colleges from the mandate.
“The G.O. seeks to indirectly curb the democratic rights of one section of teachers,” he said. Teachers of government colleges are governed by the Tamil Nadu Government Servants Conduct Rules 1973, wherein there is no provision to curb the rights of teachers from contesting elections to the bodies of the university, he added.
‘Practically impossible’
“If prior permission is made a pre-requisite before filing nomination, then it will be practically impossible for any teacher candidate to obtain the same, knowing the way in which the government machinery works,” Prof. Ravi feared.
The Tamil Nadu Government College Teachers Association president T. Veeramani said: “Only members of the Senate and Syndicate can question corruption and prevent delay in receiving funds from universities. If hurdles are placed in our way there would be no representation of government colleges in the Senate.”
S. Subbaraju, convenor, Joint Action Council of College Teachers of Tamil Nadu said the University Statutes and Act was framed after much deliberation to ensure that college teachers and principals are part of the overall functioning of the universities. “In Kerala, even the student representatives are part and parcel of the Senate and Syndicate bodies of the University,” he added.
