MADURAI: After Annamalai University Registrar (i/c), on Thursday, issued dismissal orders to 56 ineligible teaching staff working in various departments, academicians have urged Chief Minister MK Stalin, Minister for Higher Education K Ponmudy and Principal Secretary of Higher Education department A Karthik to take the action against ineligible teachers in other universities in the state as well.
Welcoming Annamalai University's action, a teaching faculty from Madurai Kamaraj University(MKU), on condition of anonymity, said, "State run universities including MKU, MS varsity and Madras University are facing financial crisis due to audit objections. Most of the audit objections are related to appointments of the staff, violations in roaster appointments, filling posts for uncalled vacancies etc. The department of higher education needs to take action akin to Annamalai University immediately in order to improve the quality of higher education and reduce the audit objections," he said.
Speaking to TNIE, Association of University Teachers (AUT) former state vice president P Thirunavukarasu said when Saminathan and Ganapathy were vice chancellors of Bharathiyar University, they appointed surplus teachers without following student-teacher ratio. "The same problem exists in all the state-run universities.
In a few departments, the number of teachers is higher than the number of students. Though the officials of the higher education department are aware of it, no action has been taken so far. If the state government seriously looks into irregular appointments and surplus appointments, the audit objections accumulated in state run universities would be automatically reduced," he said.
When TNIE asked Principal Secretary to the Higher Education Department A Karthik whether the exercise will be continued in other varsities, he replied that reports are being processed and action would be taken if any wrong doing is found.