Vice-chancellors should be appointed on the basis of merit, former governor T N Chaturvedi said on Thursday. “There is a need to amend the Varsity Act to give more powers to the Chancellor and to make appointments in varsities in a fair manner”, Mr Chaturvedi said in an interview to Deccan Herald.
Many universities of the State are mired in controversy. There should be efforts to make universities immunised and insulated from political pressure and any kind of casteist or regional influence, Mr Chaturvedi, who was also the Chancellor, said.
“If vice chancellors are good, there won’t be any such controversy. For that, vice chancellors should be appointed on the basis of merit. However, we have a system where the State Government makes many appointments in the name of the Governor,” he pointed out.
The former governor also felt that the governor of the State, who also acts as Chancellor of Universities, should hold some authority to act whenever critical issues like large-scale irregularities in universities crop up. “People have often asked me why have I not taken action, despite being aware of irregularities in universities. But I went according to the law and powers I had. Whenever I found necessary, I gave suggestions as per the moral authority that I had as Chancellor of Universities. I feel the Chancellor should have necessary authority to act during the time of crisis,” he said.
Good relation
Mr Chaturvedi said he had a good relation with all vice chancellors of the State and said universities in Karnataka had tremendous potential. However, he declined to rate universities with respect to their performance. “It is not fare to rank universities. All the universities are doing good partly. They can definitely do a better job. However, compared to universities in other states, Karnataka universities have been doing well,” he said.
When asked what was his reaction when Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy criticised Ms Sudha Rao, vice chancellor of Karnataka State Open University in public regarding regularisation of services of daily wage employees, Mr Chaturvedi refused to react. “I don’t want to discuss the issue now in detail. It is confidential and propriety of the chancellor. There was a situation and I solved it. But I feel nobody was humiliated,” he said.
Burden on exchequer
Replying to a question on additional burden on State’s exchequer due to shifting Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences to Ramanagara, Mr Chaturvedi said that it would not be a burden as somewhere it had to be set up. “It is the State Government’s decision. Earlier in the Act, it was said that it would be set up in Mysore. Later, it was shifted to Bangalore and now to Ramanagara. However, Ramanagara is close to Bangalore City. Till date, the university has been running in a rented building. Somewhere, it should have its own building and for that, money has to be spent,” he said.
Basic education
Regarding basic education in the State, the former governor said that private institutions were doing well compared to government schools. “Earlier, government schools were doing better than private institutions. There is no reason why it can’t be done now. The State Government should pay sustained attention towards improving basic education and ensure that teachers are committed to their job,” he said.
Mr Chaturvedi did not react on introduction of English as a language from the first standard. He said, “I cannot comment on the language policy. However, I am in favour of all languages. If I were younger, I would have learnt Kannada as well”.
He said by the end of his five-year tenure he could understand a little bit of Kannada. “Whenever my officials read Kannada newspapers, I could follow them”, he said.