COIMBATORE: Governor Banwarilal Purohit on Wednesday appointed Anna University former officiating vice-chancellor P Kaliraj as the new V-C of Bharathiar University. Kaliraj will hold the post for three years with effect from the date of him assuming office.
Kaliraj has 31 years of teaching experience and is at present the ICMR Emeritus Medical Scientist in the Centre for Biotechnology at Anna University. He is experienced in university administration, having functioned as officiating vice-chancellor, dean of faculty at A C College of Technology, head of Bio-technology and member of the Syndicate for 20 years at Anna University, a release from Raj Bhavan said.
Between 1999 and 2004, he had been a research collaborator with the National Institute of Health in Maryland (USA), Glasgow University in Scotland (UK) and University of Illinois in Rockford (USA).
He has published more than 69 research papers and has guided 42 research scholars in their PhD courses.
In the year 2009, he was awarded BSR Faculty Award by the University Grants Commission (UGC) and in 2013 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Biotechnology Research Society of India, it added.
Kaliraj was chosen from among the three candidates — Tamil Nadu Agricultural University professor (Agronomy) R Jagannathan and IIT Madras professor (Mathematics) S Ponnusamay being the two others — shortlisted after the interview on Tuesday. The BU has remained without a V-C after the suspension of former V-C A Ganapathy, who was arrested by the DVAC for accepting a bribe. After several months of delay, the V-C search committee shortlisted ten candidates from 147 applications and called them in for an interview.