HRD sends proposal to President’s office

SHOWCAUSE MOVE AGAINST V-C

THE HRD Ministry on Friday sent a proposal to the President’s office seeking approval to issue a showcause notice to Jawahar Lal Kaul, the Vice-chancellor of Hemvati Nanda Bahuguna Garhwal University, for alleged administrative irregularities.

As first reported by The Indian Express, the ministry’s plea against the V-C is based on the conclusions of a two-member fact-finding committee. If the President agrees, Kaul will be asked to show cause against his sacking and present his defence on close to 10 allegations.

The V-C, among other things, is accused of approving backdated affiliation to a few teacher training institutes. He is also accused of allowing the university to declare examination results of these institutes when the status of their affiliation to the university was under the scanner.

Kaul was not reachable for comment on Friday. On Thursday, when contacted for his reaction, he had denied the allegations against him. He had told The Indian Express, “The issue is not of backdated affiliation. The state High Court had ordered that the teacher training institutes had the right to permanent affiliation to HNBG University. So the university only allowed them to continue their affiliation from the time that it was deemed withdrawn. Since, the institutes had the right to affiliation, it was only natural for the university to also declare the results of the examination conducted by them. Some people are just trying to sully the image of the university with such complaints.”