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Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan on Wednesday, stayed the appointment of Priya Varghese, wife of K K Ragesh, CPI(M) leader and private secretary to the Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, as an associate professor in Kannur University’s Department of Malayalam, over alleged violation of norms and favouritism.
It was alleged that Priya, the wife of Ragesh, a former member of Rajya Sabha got the post in the Kannur-based University bypassing other candidates with a higher score in terms of the required qualifications like teaching experience, published research works etc. She allegedly had the lowest score for eligibility to shortlist the candidates but had the top marks than the other five, in the interview, which is the basis of the appointment. On August 13, reports were out that Priya had scored very less compared to another candidate Joseph Scaria. While Priya’s total score was 156, Scaria’s got 651.
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In a media release, Raj Bhavan stated that governor Khan, in his capacity as chancellor of the university, ‘stayed the Resolution (No. 2022.313 dated 27.06.2022) of Kannur University Syndicate and all further proceedings pursuant to the selection procedure…with immediate effect until further orders.’ The governor also issued a show-cause notice to Kannur University vice chancellor Prof Gopinath Ravindran. He told the media that he will challenge the governor’s stay order in court.
Khan’s decision to stay the appointment comes a day after the state cabinet ratified the draft of a Bill that proposes to curtail the power of the governor, as chancellor of state universities, in the appointment of vice-chancellors. This will be presented in the assembly later this month. Since being appointed governor in 2019, Khan has had many face-offs with the Kerala government.
Priya, through three social media post posts, on August 15, 16 and 18, explained this huge difference in scores while alleging ‘this is part of a trial by the media against her for being the wife of a communist leader.’ She, in a Facebook post on August 15, stated that the reports that other candidates scored higher marks than her to be recruited to the post are ‘lies’.
“As it was the time of the Covid pandemic, the application for the post was submitted online. After filling up the datasheet online The score of a candidate will be generated automatically. The digits (scores) that are shown as secured (by her and the other five candidates in reports as a response to an RTI query) are those online generated scores. These scores usually get verified on the day of the interview. But in this case, since the interview was also online, no verification was done. Hence the scores, are just claims. The University has not verified those yet,” she explained in her post on August 15.
In her second post on August 16, she clarified some of her claims in the earlier one. Taking a dig at the media persons, she said how can you convince the ‘ma pra’ (abbreviation for media persons in Malayalam coined by the left cyber handles) who would read ‘dog’ when someone has written as ‘ goat’
On her alleged shortage of teaching experience, on August 18, Priya quoted UGC norms, “The period taken by candidates to acquire MPhil and/or PhD degree shall not be considered as teaching/ research experience to be claimed for appointment to the teaching positions. Further the period of active service spent on pursuing Research Degree simultaneously with teaching assignment without taking any kind of leave shall be counted as teaching experience for the purpose of direct recruitment/ promotion.” (sic)
A day before the extraordinary decision, the governor had hammered the Kannur University authorities. “I am surprised to see that right from the Advocate General to the UGC to the ministry, everyone’s opinion is being sought, but the Chancellor is being kept in the dark. Why am I being kept in the dark? I have the institutions. Why? There must be some reason. It is probably because they wanted to hide these things (alleged irregularities) from me,” the governor told the media.
According to him, he was ‘concerned’ about the state of affairs in the higher education sector in the state as there were alleged ‘very serious irregularities on the face of it at Kannur University.
As per the proposed bill, the state government will recommend the nominee of the governor. With this, the upper hand of the governor in the VC appointments will be over. The VC selection committee has three members – one representative of UGC, the university senate and the governor. He, however, said, ‘anything proposed becomes a law only after the signature of the governor.’ CPM state secretary Kodiyari Balakrishnan has accused the BJP of using Kerala governor as a tool to topple the LDF government.
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