Jadavpur University returned the DLitt and DSc (honorary) certificates to governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Sunday morning, a day after he called up the vice-chancellor and allegedly expressed dissatisfaction over the decision to defer the special convocation without his consent.

Officials said the governor, who is also chancellor of the university, had called up VC Suranjan Das on Saturday night and asked him to return the certificates, which Dhankhar had signed.

The university had on Saturday decided at an “emergency” meeting of its executive council that the chancellor would not be invited to the annual convocation on December 24 because students have decided to boycott him if he attends the programme.

The same meeting also deferred the special convocation — also scheduled for December 24 — wherein the chancellor awards the honorary degrees.

On Sunday morning, a JU official went to Raj Bhavan and handed over the certificates to the chancellor’s office. “The chancellor wanted the certificates to be returned to him and so we returned them to Raj Bhavan,” VC Das told Metro on Sunday.

He declined to talk about his telephonic conversation with Dhankhar the night before. JU sources, however, said Dhankhar had expressed dissatisfaction over the decision to defer the special convocation without his nod.

The VC refused to say how and when the honorary degrees would be handed out.

An official said the university had called a meeting of its court on Monday to decide how the convocation would be held without the governor.

The chancellor’s office told this newspaper that Dhankhar would preside over the meeting.

Hours after JU handed the certificates to the governor’s office, Dhankhar sent a WhatsApp message to this newspaper: “A question has thus arisen as to ‘whether the Executive Council has acted in accordance with the powers conferred on it by or under the Act’ in passing the resolution — the convocation programme of 24 December 2019, as decided earlier, be deferred. I thus invoke the power reposed in me as Chancellor... if any question arises as to whether the Executive Council has acted in accordance with the powers conferred on it... the matter shall be decided by reference to the Chancellor whose decision shall be final.”

On JU’s decision to keep the chancellor away from the annual convocation, he said: “Such a course would also have potential to adversely impact the students who may be conferred degrees in an illegal convocation...”