KALABURAGI: The term of vice-chancellors of five universities in the state is set to end between June 14 and 20, but the Higher Education Department is yet to expedite the selection process.
According to official sources, the term of Gulbarga University V-C SR Niranjan, Karnataka University V-C Pramod B Gai, Kuvempu University V-C Jogan Shankar, Kittur Rani Chennamma University V-C S B Hosamani and Vijaynagara Sri Krishnadevaraya University V-C M S Subhas will come to an end in June this year as they will be completing four years of service. As there is no provision to give extension for V-Cs under the Karnataka University Act, the Higher Education Department has just started expediting the selection process.
The department has written to registrars of the five universities to ask the respective syndicate committees to nominate one member for search committee to be constituted by the government to shortlist three names for the V-C posts. Gulbarga University registrar C Somashekhar has confirmed that he received the letter from the Higher Education Department instructing to nominate one member for the search committee. He said the government will appoint a separate search committee for all the five varsities.
The search committee will have four members: one nominee from the university concerned as per the suggestion of the syndicate committee, one nominee from the government, one nominee from the University Grants Commission and one Governor’s nominee. The state government may nominate its member as search committee chairman or may nominate a chairman separately, sources said. Though the process to form a search committee started in January, it could not materialise as the universities were busy holding UG and PG exams and the Lok Sabha polls.
Recently, the search committees for Rani Chennamma University, Belagavi and Sri Krishnadevaraya University, Ballari, have been constituted and applications from eligible candidates for the posts have been invited.
These search committees have to hold meetings and shortlist three names and send them to the government and in turn, the government should send them to the Governor. The Governor has to choose one among the shortlisted names or can reject the list. As this is the case, it will be difficult to get new V-Cs within the retirement of existing ones, sources said.
With regard to Gulbarga University, Karnataka University, Dharwad and Kuvempu University, Shivamogga, the search committees have not yet been constituted. The Gulbarga University syndicate committee is meeting on June 7 to nominate its representative for the search committee.
As this is the case, there will be no chance to appointment new V-Cs to any of the five universities as per procedure and the outgoing V-Cs may have to hand over the charge to the senior most dean, they said.