The Gujarat government appointed the Dean of the Department of Technology and Engineering, Professor Dhanesh Patel, as in-charge VC of the university hours after MS University vice-chancellor VK Shrivastava, whose three-year tenure was mired in controversies, informed the Gujarat High Court that he had tendered his resignation to the additional chief secretary.
Gujarat Advocate General Kamal Trivedi informed the court that the state government had accepted Shrivastava’s resignation.
Patel will be in charge until the permanent VC is appointed in February. The state government informed the HC on January 3 that a search committee had been constituted for the appointment of VC, for which it received 80 applications.
The charge had to be handed over to another official and the final acceptance of the resignation would be done by Thursday, Trivedi informed the court, a national daily reported.
For background, the HC heard senior professor Satish Pathak’s petition from the Department of Education challenging the February 10, 2022 appointment of Shrivastava.
Pathak had moved the HC in November 2023, calling the appointment illegal since Shrivastava did not honour the University Grants Commission (UGC) eligibility criteria of 10 years of experience as a professor.
The PIL, published by a section of the media, stated, “(Shrivastava), who has been appointed as (MSU) Vice Chancellor, has not served in any of the colleges or universities having a national importance. Therefore, there is no evidence in favour… that he has 10 years’ experience in reputed research and/or academic administrative organisation with proof of having demonstrated academic leadership… but it appears that before the committee, only bio-data was submitted and neither any proof nor any documentary evidence was produced or submitted.
“Therefore, it appears that without ascertaining the credentials and the proof of evidence, solely on the bio data submitted by (Shrivastava), the search committee has identified and selected the name of respondent no 6 for the post of vice-chancellor.”
Pathak said the search committee, itself, was “not constituted in consonance with the UGC Act and the Regulations”.
A section of the petition reads, “(Shrivastava) is neither eligible nor qualified and even not been appointed by the committee constituted in consonance with the Act, and therefore, the appointment is required to be quashed and set aside”.
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