Legally India: Delhi: Friday,
24 July 2020.
More
than 100 NLU Delhi students have sent a letter to NLU Delhi’s chancellor -
Delhi high court chief justice Dhirubhai Naranbhai Patel - and its visitor -
Supreme Court Justice NV Ramana - to accelerate the hunt for a new vice
chancellor (VC), which has now taken more than nine months without any obvious
idea of the outcome.
The open
letter, which was also signed by five NLU Delhi alumni, implores the judges to
“intervene” and call to convene the university’s governing council to expedite
the process.
The
letter stated that “matters have proceeded at a sluggish pace with no
transparency” and that “despite multiple attempts by the student body to engage
with the selection committee, they have been kept in the dark about the entire
process”.
There is
no timeline about when a new VC would be appointed, and incumbent and founding
VC, Prof Ranbir Singh, is on a temporary one-year extension until 23 September
2020, which is fast approaching.
On top
of that, the “avoidable delay” came at a “crucial stage” in NLU Delhi’s
history, with decisions needing to be made about how to deal with the Covid-19
pandemic, which might benefit from having a VC actually see them through and
implemented.
According
to the students, those decisions include how to graduate the current final
batch into the pandemic, any potential fee waivers due to the NLU being in
distance education mode, rather than in Delhi), and the upcoming All India Law
Entrance Test (AILET) exam, which will be held via online proctoring .
One
fourth year student who is a signatory to the letter, Aadarsh Singh, has also
filed a Right to Information (RTI) request with the university today,
requesting the names of what are believed to be three candidates who have been
shortlisted for the VC position (see full text of RTI below).
The
RTI asked for:
Please
provide the following information under the Right to Information Act 2005 with
respect to the Selection Committee constituted in the year 2019 to search for the
next Vice-Chancellor of National Law University Delhi:
1. The
Selection Committee issued an advertisement dated 11.10.19 to invite
applications for the post of Vice-Chancellor. As per records, please provide
the name of candidates who applied for the post of Vice-Chancellor in the
period 11.10.19 to 11.11.19.
2. As
per records, please provide the name of candidates who have been shortlisted by
the Selection Committee for the position of Vice-Chancellor of National Law
University Delhi.
3. As
per records, please provide the minutes of all the meetings of the Selection
Committee.
The NLU
Delhi VC process has also attracted a writ petition by NLU Delhi English
professor Prof (Dr) Prasannanshu, who also alleged that the process has been
shrouded in opacity so far.
Full
NLU Delhi students' letter to VC
We, the
undersigned, write to your kind self in your capacity as the Chancellor of the
University. We wish to bring your attention to the pending issue of the
appointment of a new Vice-Chancellor of the University. As your kind self might
be aware, a Selection Committee was constituted way back in September 2019 to
look for the next Vice-Chancellor of the University. Applications were invited
for the position of Vice-Chancellor through a notification dated 11.10.2019. As
per the notification, the deadline for applying for the position of
Vice-Chancellor was set as 11.11.2019.
Since
the above-mentioned notification, the matters have proceeded at a sluggish pace
with no transparency. Despite multiple attempts by the student body to engage
with the Selection Committee, they have been kept in the dark about the entire
process. Despite the passage of over 9 months since its constitution, there is
still no timeline regarding the appointment of the next Vice-Chancellor. The
snail-paced process attains all the more importance in light of the fact that
as per notification dated 20.07.2018 [attached], the tenure of the present
Vice-Chancellor would end on 23rd September 2020.
This
avoidable delay in the appointment of the new Vice-Chancellor comes at a
crucial stage as the institution is faced with multiple decisions involving the
interests of the students. Besides formulating the new academic calendar in
light of the pandemic, the institution is also faced with key decisions
pertaining to the award of course degrees to the graduating Batch of 2020, fee
waivers (owing to distance education), smooth conduct of All India Law Entrance
Examination (AILET), etc. The administrative delay in the Vice-Chancellor’s
appointment is likely to adversely affect the above-mentioned issues.
In light
of this, we, the undersigned, humbly request you to intervene in this matter
and call for a meeting of the Governing Council so that the process of
appointment of the Vice-Chancellor can be expedited.
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