MADURAI: After the Madras High Court set aside the appointment of P P Chellathurai as the Madurai Kamaraj University Vice-Chancellor, he has moved the Supreme Court on Monday, seeking a stay on the order.
The order follows a petition filed by M Lionel Antony Raj, a member of People’s Rights Protection Centre, questioning the appointment of Chellathurai as “he has not completed his service as professor for 10 years to be eligible for the post.”
The petition also cites the malpractices done during the selection process by the V-C Search Committee and an attempt to murder case against Chellathurai.
Quashing the appointment of Chellathurai, the court on Thursday, also directed the authorities to form a new V-C search committee (without the members from the old committee) and to submit the list of candidates within three months.
As per the judgment, State Higher Education Secretary Sunil Paliwal, on Saturday, appointed a three-member convenor committee.
The members of the panel includes S S Poovalingam, Secretary, Law Department and an ex-officio member of MKU’s syndicate, N S Santhosh Kumar, Director of Legal studies and an ex-officio member of syndicate and M Ramakrishnan, syndicate member and Head of Department of Computer Applications at Madurai Kamaraj University.
On the same day, MKU Syndicate also selected C Thangamuthu, former Vice-Chancellor of Bharathidasan University, as its nominee to the vice chancellor search committee.
For the functioning of the Vice Chancellor search committee, Governor should appoint a convener and the Madurai Kamaraj University senate need to select a member for Vice Chancellor search committee.
Stalin demands sacking
Chennai: DMK working president M K Stalin on Monday demanded sacking of Vice-Chancellor of Madurai Kamaraj University P P Chelladurai, whose appointment was set aside by the Madras High Court recently. He said the government should have dismissed him immediately after the court verdict, but it failed to do so, raising suspicions. Condemning the government for giving a window for going on an appeal in the Supreme Court against the Madras High Court’s order, he charged that the interview for the selection was held at a star hotel located near the Raj Bhavan and that too, it lasted just for 25 minutes. The Higher Education secretary should immediately constitute a special team to go into the irregularities committed during the stint of Chelladurai in the university, Stalin said.