CHENNAI : The State government has appointed former IAS officer N Sundaradevan for the second time as its nominee for Anna University Vice-Chancellor selection committee. Though the appointment was made some nearly two weeks ago, the news came out only on Monday.“We found him very competent and honest so we appointed him once again after getting the Chief Minister’s approval,” said Higher Education Secretary Sunil Paliwal.Sundaradevan, who retired as a principal secretary-rank officer in the State government, was the State government’s choice for the last VC search committee also that was headed by former Supreme Court judge R M Lodha.
He retired from service in September, 2012 and in June last he was also appointed as the independent director of the State Trading Corporation of India, which is run by the Union government last August.
Since the committee headed by Lodha has become dysfunctional, a new search committee is being formed again to select Vice-Chancellor for the Anna University. The university has been functioning without VC for nearly last one-and-half years.
R Gnanamoorthy, a professor in IIT Madras, was selected as the Anna University syndicate’s nominee last week. According to academia from the varsity, the professors are hopeful that if two of the VC search committee members are appointed, soon a Governor’s nominee will be appointed, which will make the committee complete and it can start hunting for the next Vice-Chancellor of the university.
“We are hopeful that the third member be appointed soon. We don’t want any further delay in VC appointment. Many important works in the varsity have been stalled by the delay,” said a faculty.Another faculty said that the completion of the new search committee would be finished soon and within a month VC would be appointed. “We want the appointment of VC to be done in another month,” he said.