“The office of the Visitor in Central Universities should be dispensed with by making appropriate amendments in the Act and the powers of the Visitor shall be transferred to the Office of the Chancellor,” a six-member committee, headed by professor N R Madhava Menon, has recommended in its report submitted to the Ministry of Human Resource Development.
The committee was of the view that the President of India, being the highest constitutional position in the country, should not be asked to be involved in administrative and academic matters relating to the universities.
“The number of central universities being more than 40 and with a dozen more innovation universities in the offing, it will not be appropriate to pinch on the valuable time of the President for running the affairs of the universities,” it stated.
The panel also recommended chancellors of universities should not be appointed by the Visitor. First chancellor of the universities should be appointed by the HRD ministry from a panel of three names recommended by the present executive council of the university.
Subsequent chancellors should be selected by the current chancellor from a panel of three names recommended by the executive committee chancellor of the university, it added.
It stressed that chancellors should be an eminent person free of political affiliation drawn from the academia or industry. The committee noted that it has been invariably seen that unless the head of the institution is a person of academic excellence, he or she will not be able to exercise due authority in the university. “Leadership selection is done only after due application of mind in a very objective and unbiased mechanism,” the panel said.
Vice-Chancellors (V-Cs) should have a tenure of five years and the selection process must be completed in three months before the expiry of the term of the incumbent. This apart, the V-Cs must be eligible for re-appointment for another term provided the executive council makes such a recommendation.
In other cases, V-Cs should be appointed on the basis of the recommendation of a three-member search-cum-selection committee of which two members should be nominees of the executive council. The chairman of the committee should be nominated by the chancellor.
The search-cum-selection committee should solicit nominations from academics, V-Cs, directors of national institutions, secretaries of science ministries and other related departments of the government, the panel suggested.
