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Arjun posts under scan

New Delhi, June 7: The UPA government is preparing to scrutinise controversial education appointments made under former human resource development minister Arjun Singh. Key appointments made under Arjun, especially during his last days in office, are likely to be reviewed amid repeated allegations that norms were ignored in these selections, officials have told The Telegraph.

The first steps towards a review have been initiated and the scan on appointments comes with specific political support from Rahul Gandhi, the officials said. New HRD minister Kapil Sibal has already ordered a time-bound University Grants Commission probe into all institutions granted deemed-to-be-university status and has frozen all pending applications for this status.

Deemed universities exploded in numbers during the five years when Arjun was at the helm of India’s education establishment, despite frequent suggestions of corruption by officials involved in the grant of the status.

A probe into appointments made under the former minister will help satisfy the country that this government is keen to clean up education of corruption and sycophancy, an official said.

Three weeks into the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls, when the Election Commission’s model code of conduct was in place, Arjun appointed a close aide accused of caste bias as vice-chairman of the UGC. Professor Ved Prakash, hurriedly appointed UGC vice-chairman, was accused of caste discrimination by colleagues during an earlier stint as secretary of the apex higher education regulator.

Although Arjun portrayed himself as a messiah of traditionally suffering communities, including Dalits, he rejected demands for a probe into the allegations of caste bias against Prakash.

On the eve of the model code of conduct, Arjun’s ministry pushed through the appointments of vice-chancellors to 15 new central universities that are starting this year, triggering allegations of foul play. Most among those selected for the 15 new posts of VCs are known to be close to Arjun and were previously appointed officials of administrative bodies like the UGC by him.

Some of the new VCs were previously vice-chancellors of existing universities that were left headless by the new appointments. Arjun’s appointments of directors to the Indian Institutes of Technology has also faced criticism from within the academic fraternity for violating the procedure laid down in the IIT Act that governs the engineering schools.

Under the IIT Act, directors are to be appointed by the IIT Council, the highest decision making body of the institutes, which is headed by the HRD minister of the day.

But the directors of all seven older IITs were shortlisted by panels handpicked by Arjun, who then approved the choice in his capacity as chairman of the IIT Council — without consulting this body even once.

Madras High Court declared the reappointment of the IIT Madras director for a second term as illegal because the IIT Council was ignored in the selection. A division bench of the high court later stayed the order for the duration of the hearing of the case, which is still on.