After MSU allows him to continue teaching, plea in HC against BJP councillor

Indian Express: Ahmedabad: Thursday, 10 December 2015.

A day after the MSU allowed its assistant professor Bharat Dangar, who is now BJP’s Vadodara city unit president after he won the local body polls, to continue as a faculty, a petition filed in the High Court Wednesday challenged the varsity’s “unprecedented move”. Dangar is said to be an aspirant of Vadodara’s mayor.

The petition has been filed by Dangar’s colleague Nikul K Patel, who was set to contest the local polls on a Congress ticket. Patel had applied to contest from the varsity as per the norms, with a condition that if he won he’d leave the varsity as a faculty. The varsity sanctioned his application.

However, after he found out through an RTI application that a councillor gets only Rs 3,000 per month, he didn’t contest, “How can the varsity waive off the condition? I have challenged the notice issued by the varsity syndicate that waived off the condition for Dangar. This is in now way justifiable,” Patel said.

The notice, issued on December 8, was addressed to the dean of Faculty of Technology and Engineering. It states to modify the condition of permission given to Dangar for continuing of services as a teacher at MSU and for providing services only as municipal counsellor (councillor) at Vadodara Mahanagar Seva Sadan (VMSS) provided that his services as municipal councillor at the VMSS shall not adversely affect his role as a teacher considering the existing statues, ordinances and rules in force.

In the plea, likely to be heard Thursday, the petitioner said that he didn’t contest only because of the condition which has been modified for one person.