A meeting of the Calicut University Syndicate held here on Tuesday decided to remove L. Thomas Kutty from the post of Head of the Department of Malayalam, and M. Shamina, Assistant Professor, Department of Botany, from the post of research guide after they were accused of discriminating against students on the basis of their caste.
The decision follows a recommendations by a sub-committee of the Syndicate, which was asked to look into the allegations. Mr. Thomas Kutty was reported to have delayed the research work of students. Four girl students accused Ms. Shamina of interfering in their personal matters and also delaying their research work. They had directly approached the Vice-Chancellor. Earlier, two other students belonging to the Scheduled Tribes too had complained against the same teacher.
The sub-committee had found serious lapses on the part of the teacher that “brought disrepute to the university”. Shamshad Hussain, M. Manoharan, Tom K. Thomas, and M. Nasar were the sub-committee members. The sub-committee had also proposed setting up a grievance redress mechanism to handle similar complaints in the future and asked the authorities to help the complainants finish their research work.
The Syndicate also decided to set up a Centre for Urdu Studies at the university. Funds would be allocated for the preliminary works on the International Avian Research Centre to be set up in association with the Kerala Veterinary and Animal Sciences University. An officer would be appointed in New Delhi to liaison with the University Grants Commission. A Fab Lab would be set up on the varsity campus in association with the Kerala Startup Mission. Applications would not be called for recognition of new courses and new colleges in 2020-21 and 2021-22 academic years.
