Governor C.V. Ananda Bose, who is chancellor of the state universities, on Wednesday asked a teacher of the Maulana Abul Kalam Azad University of Technology to perform the duties of vice-chancellor of the university.
The chancellor contacted Indranil Mukherjee directly and asked him to perform the VC’s duties. The university had been functioning without a VC for nearly one-and-a-half months.
The chancellor, who seems to be on a collision course with the state education department over controlling the universities, selected Mukherjee, instead of the teacher whose name was recommended by the education department, said an official of the department.
“We had recommended the name of a pro-VC, who also served as dean of engineering at a state university. But the chancellor wrote to Indranil Mukherjee directly, asking him to take charge, without sharing any copy of the order with the department,” the official told The Telegraph.
Mukherjee, a teacher of management and business administration, has been asked to perform VC’s duties till further orders. “I have been asked by the chancellor to perform the duties of VC till further orders,” said Mukherjee.
An official of the university said Mukherjee was among the senior teachers of the university whose names were sought by the chancellor.
“Since the process of selecting a full-term VC through a search committee has not started, a stop-gap arrangement is being worked out,” said an official of the department.
Saikat Maitra quit as VC of the tech university on March 16 after his name featured among the 24 vice-chancellors whose appointments were set aside by Calcutta High Court on March 14 on the ground that the government had not followed UGC procedures while appointing them.
