Former Periyar varsity V-C booked on charges of appointing ineligible persons

SALEM: Directorate of Vigilance and Anti Corruption (DVAC) registered two cases against Periyar University former Vice-Chancellor (V-C) C Swaminathan in connection with appointment of ineligible persons in teaching and non-teaching posts, giving affiliation to private colleges which did not have basic infrastructure, apart from outsourcing publication work of semester examination results to a private firm.

On December 18, 2017, former PU Registrar K Angamuthu died by suicide at Perundurai, Erode. In February 2018, his wife Vijayalakshmi lodged a complaint with the DVAC director against Swaminathan and other officials of the varsity. She submitted an alleged suicide note left behind by Angamuthu, in which he had raised various allegations against Swaminathan and others. Based on it, the DVAC conducted an inquiry and registered cases.

In an FIR, the DVAC stated Swaminathan served as V-C between June 2014 to June 2017, and during this period malpractices on a large scale had been committed in appointment of 154 teaching faculty. It was found that Swaminathan, with connivance of late Angamuthu, appointed ineligible candidates after receiving illegal gratification.

A committee had been appointed to scrutinise the applications. Swaminathan forced committee members to declare ineligible candidates as eligible. In some cases, he made them sign documents that did not even mention names of selected candidates. Swaminathan was not available for comments. PU V-C R Jagannathan said he would comment on the matter after looking into the details of FIRs.