CHENNAI: Countering Governor RN Ravi’s allegation that the vice chancellors of universities were threatened by Chief Minister MK Stalin, Higher Education Minister Govi Chezhiaan said intimidation politics is part of BJP’s DNA.
Earlier, Ravi alleged that the chief minister used the police to threaten the vice chancellors to prevent them from attending the conference he convened in Ooty.
Chezhiaan said, “The V-Cs took part in the conference organised by Ravi in the past. But this time, they did not participate. Why? It’s a no-brainer. In the light of the Supreme Court verdict, the V-Cs boycotted the conference. How can the state government be responsible for that?”
The minister contended that the V-Cs know about the Supreme Court verdict but only the governor, despite knowing everything, is doing politics because of his adamancy.
Following the Supreme Court verdict, the governor “unlawfully convened” a vice chancellors’ conference. The vice chancellors did not attend, as they believed it would be unlawful to do so, Chezhiaan said. “If the governor organised the conference without respecting the law, is it necessary for the V-Cs to do the same,” he asked.
Recalling Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s earlier stance from the Madan Mohan Punchhi Commission report when he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Chezhiaan said, “According to the report, Modi opposed appointing politicians as governors. But after becoming Prime Minister, he has been using governors to trouble states ruled by opposition parties.”
Meanwhile, DMK Rajya Sabha member and senior advocate P Wilson took to X platform to condemn Ravi for his remarks. Wilson posted, “I condemn these false and irresponsible statements made by Governor RN Ravi who is proving to be incorrigible. How can a governor make such baseless allegations against his own government?”
Wilson said making false statements likely to cause subversive actions against the state government is a serious crime, and added that the governor must not abuse the immunity granted to him under Article 361(2).
Alleging that Ravi’s intention was to ‘poison’ universities with a particular ideology, Wilson said, “We will not allow anybody to politicise education or peddle pseudoscience and irrational ideologies.”