SANTINIKETAN: Bidyut Chakraborty, the newly appointed vice chancellor of Visva-Bharati University, has assumed office, a month after the President Ram Nath Kovind cleared his name for the position.
Chakraborty, a former professor of the Delhi University, reached Santiniketan Friday morning, along with his family members, and paid tribute to Rabindranath Tagore on the university premises before taking charge from officiating vice chancellor Sabuj Koli Sen.
Sen, who received him at the institute, said, "We welcome Chakraborty cordially to the university and hope all people concerned will come forward to cooperate with him.
" The central university, set up by Tagore, has been running without a permanent head since 2016, after Sushanta Duttagupta was removed from the post of VC on ground of irregularities by the then HRD Minister Smriti Irani.
Saugata Chattopadhyay, the officiating registrar of the university, said Chakraborty briefly interacted with senior officials and teachers upon his arrival.
"The new VC met the senior officials and visited places of importance on the university campus, including Rabindra Bhavana, before joining office. He left for his ancestral home at Suri later in the day," Chattopadhyay said.
Expressing hope that Chakraborty would address the grievances of students and teachers, Sudipta Bhattacharya, the president of Visva Bharati University Faculty Association, said several measures need to be taken to restore the glory of the institute.
"We are looking forward to a fresh beginning. The new VC is an experienced person and a good scholar. We have been deprived of promotion for a long time and a number of posts are lying vacant at the university. We hope necessary actions will be taken to solve the crises," Bhattacharya added.
An alumnus of Ballygunge Government High School, Chakrabarty earned his master's degree from the University of Calcutta before moving to London School of Economics for Ph.D
In 1998, he joined the University of Delhi as a professor of political science.