Following the revelation that the Bihar School Examination Board was manufacturing toppers in matriculation and intermediate examinations in exchange of speed money, universities in Bihar are in the news for several cases of irregularities.
Bihar Governor Ram Nath Kovind, who is also the Chancellor of the state’s universities, is flooded with complaints of large-scale irregularities being done by the different vice chancellors. Kovind has set up three inquiry commissions in the last one month against three different universities.
The Governor has also come down strictly on the issue of teachers bunking classes, which is a common problem in Bihar.
Last month, a committee headed by a retired Patna High Court was set up by the Governor to look into the irregularities regarding affiliation, purchase of materials and nepotism at Maulana Mazharul Haque Arabic and Persian University, Patna.
Patna based officials said that it was the third judicial probe ordered by the Chancellor in a fortnight to inquire into the irregularities in universities of Bihar.
Earlier this year, the Chancellor had constituted two separate committees. One committee was mandated to probe the irregularities done in 2011 in the appointment of assistant professors-cum-junior scientists at Bihar Agricultural University, Sabour. The other committee is probing the wrongdoings done by the acting vice-chancellors of all the universities, except L.N. Mithila University, since April 2013.
All these acting VCs were appointed by former Governor Devanand Konwar.
While Justice (Retd) Sadanand Mukherjee of Patna High Court was appointed to look into the irregularities in Maulana Mazharul Haque Arabic and Persian University, Justice (Retd) Md Mahfooz Alam of the Patna HC has been asked to inquire into the BAU appointments when Mewa Lal Chaudhary, now a JDU MLA, was its vice-chancellor.
Similarly, the Governor had appointed Justice (Retd) Akhilesh Chandra on 25 May as the chairman of the three-member committee to probe the alleged irregularities committed by the acting VCs in Bihar who were appointed since April 2013.
The Chandra committee has been asked to inquire into all the irregularities committed in appointments, promotions and financial transactions during the period of the acting VCs’ tenure.
Ram Nath Kovind issued a directive earlier this month that the faculty members in the universities and colleges should be available in the campus for at least five hours every day and not less than 40 hours a week.
The directive has also asked the VCs to send a fax report daily by 3 pm, giving details about the faculty members who are absent without taking permission.
In April, the Governor asked the concerned VCs to send a detailed reply to him on his email asking about the vocational courses that were being run in their universities and whether the proposal for running the same had been taken from the government, or not. The news of these irregularities follow the BSEB scam, in which candidates who paid a bribe money of Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh, were declared toppers by manipulating their answer sheets.