Five university teachers, who were told to come to the Raj Bhavan on Saturday if they were interested in a vice-chancellor’s job, met a Raj Bhavan official instead of the governor.
An adviser to the governor, S.K. Pattanayak, asked the teachers whether they would be interested in heading state-aided universities and if they had any preferred institute. They were also provided with papers that highlighted the powers of the chancellor, said sources at the Raj Bhavan.
The governor is the ex-officio chancellor of the state universities.
The interaction at the Raj Bhavan took place days after the attorney-general, representing the chancellor, submitted in the Supreme Court that six vacancies for VCs would be filled by appointing candidates from a list recommended by the state government.
However, other than one, the academics who turned up did not match the list that the higher education department sent to Raj Bhavan on Wednesday.
From the government’s list of six, only Bhaskar Gupta, a Jadavpur University electronics and telecommunication engineering professor who was recommended for the post of interim VC at JU, got the invitation.
Asutosh Ghosh, Prem Poddar, Amiya Kumar Panda, Pabitra Chattopadhyay and Tapan Kumar Biswas, who were recommended for five other universities, were not invited. Instead, Ranjan Chakrabrati, Sonali Chakravarti Banerjee, Anuradha Mukhopadhyay, Sauren Bandyopadhyay, Tapati Guha Thakurta and Amitava Datta, who were part of a list of 31 professors sent by the government in January, were invited to Raj Bhavan.
Guha Thakurta and Datta declined to turn up.
Education minister Bratya Basu wrote on his X handle: “It has been learnt that the Chancellor had not met his guests there. They were subjected to some long drawn lectures on the powers of the chancellors by some officials instead.”
“He has not only defiled the basic decorum of Indian hospitality but also has insulted the eminent academicians of our State in the process. This is how he treats the top most educationists of Bengal! #shame!”
Governor C.V. Ananda Bose, in a statement on Saturday evening, said: “8 candidates suggested by the Government were called for a discussion today. 3 persons did not turn up... 3 others who attended said they wanted the Universities of their choice. Two candidates were willing to be appointed as interim VCs in the vacant Universities. A few more persons suggested by the Government will be called for discussions on 22.04.2024.”
