Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala will file a review petition against the Supreme Court verdict canceling the appointment of VC. The appointment of Dr. Rajashree M., VC of the University of Science and Technology, has been cancelled. The order of the Supreme Court accepted the argument that the appointment was not in accordance with the rules. But it is argued that the UGC Rules of 2010 are only of a prescriptive nature. Government sources say that the Supreme Court itself has ruled that there is no obligation to implement it. The government is also raising objections that the UGC rules, which empower the government to constitute a search committee, were not considered.
The verdict was delivered by a bench comprising justices MR Shah and CV Ravikumar. The petitioners pointed out in the court that the appointment of Dr. Rajashree was not according to the UGC rules of 2013. The Supreme Court upheld this argument. On February 2, 2019, Dr. Rajashree MS was appointed as the VC of the Technical University. Questioning this, Dr. Sreejith PS, the former dean of Kusat, approached the Supreme Court.
The petition alleges three significant violations. The first of these is to form a search committee to recommend the Vice-Chancellor, and as per UGC rules, it is this panel that forwards the names to the Governor. But only Rajshree’s name was handed over to the Governor. This name was accepted by the Governor. The main allegation is that this is a violation of UGC rules. The search committee should include only members from the education sector. But the Chief Secretary was also a member of the search committee formed by the government. The court also accepted the contention of the petitioners that the Chief Secretary was not an expert in the field of education.