Visva-Bharati has placed under suspension a professor who heads a teachers’ body and who has been a critic of Vice Chancellor Bidyut Chakrabarty.
Sudipta Bhattacharyya, a professor of Economics, who has been giving voice to faculty members who felt aggrieved, was placed under suspension on Thursday for alleging irregularities in the appointment of the principal of Patha Bhavana, one of the institutions of Visva Bharati.
“...the Executive Council in its meeting held on January 7 observed that Prof. Sudipta Bhattacharyya prima facie committed misconduct by mass circulating a complaint and derogatory/defamatory/baseless remarks against a fellow employee and also forwarding copies of the same to high dignitaries by email,” the suspension order said.
The action against him is hardly surprising; in fact it was only expected, considering that Professor Bhattacharyya, who heads the Visva-Bharati University Faculty Association (VBUFA) proved to be a pinprick for the VC ever since the latter took charge in November 2018.
It was due to the VBUFA that several decisions taken by the authorities that did not go down well with faculty members got highlighted in the media, following which an order was issued prohibiting any employee other than the PRO from speaking to reporters.
Amartya Sen issue
What irritated the VC the most, according to sources, was the recent controversy regarding Nobel laureate Amartya Sen . Last month, during a virtual meeting with faculty members, the VC made a claim that he had received a call from Professor Sen, who introduced himself as “Bharat Ratna Amartya Sen” and requested that hawkers outside his Santiniketan home not be evicted. Subsequently, the VBUFA president emailed Professor Sen, who denied making any such call.
When the university reiterated that the Nobel laureate had indeed called the VC and even pinpointed the time the call was made — in June 2019 — Professor Bhattacharyya once again wrote to the Nobel laureate, who rubbished the claim as “tantalisingly untrue”.
Following this unpleasant publicity, it was expected that disciplinary action would be taken against Professor Bhattacharyya sooner than later. He is now said to be preparing to challenge his suspension in the Calcutta High Court.
