West Bengal VC Appointments | Experts Known To Applicant For VC Post To Not Form Part Of Selection Committee : Supreme Court

In the dispute pending between the West Bengal government and Governor CV Anand Bose regarding appointment of Vice-Chancellors (VCs) to Universities, the Supreme Court yesterday directed that two experts known to an applicant for the VC-post shall not be part of the Selection Committee when his application is considered.

A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan passed the order on an interim application filed by one Dr. Indrajit Lahiri (an applicant for the VC-post for 36 Universities), wherein he stated fairly that two of the experts constituting the Committee knew him well and the same could lead to a presumption of bias.

Justice Kant dictated the order thus: "He (applicant) has fairly pointed out that two experts namely...are close to him, and that respondent No.34 has also worked under them. He has pointed out that there may be a presumption of bias by others...it is clarified that [the two named experts] will not be there in the Search-cum-Selection Committee at the time of consideration of candidature of Dr. Indrajit Lahiri".

The bench further recorded that the clarification was being made as Dr Lahiri himself had approached the Court, so that no adverse inference is drawn against his candidature.

Insofar as an issue regarding non-prescription of age limit in the advertisement was also raised, the Court stated that it was dealt with in an earlier order passed in July. However, if an overaged candidate applies, the same shall be considered by the Search-cum-Selection Committee in accordance with the University statute.

For context, in the July order, the court had said, "we endorse the suggestion given by the parties that let the age of retirement of these Vice-chancellors be 65 years, as per the Statutes. For the remaining Universities, the age of retirement of the ViceChancellor shall be 70 years".

To recap, the Court was dealing with a special leave petition filed by the state of West Bengal, challenging a June 2023 judgment of the Calcutta High Court upholding interim vice-chancellor appointments made by Governor Bose in 13 universities (in his capacity as the chancellor of the institutions).

On July 8, Search-cum-Selection Committees were constituted for the Universities under the chairmanship of ex-Chief Justice of India UU Lalit. The Committees, encompassing five members, were to prepare a panel of three names for each university for VC appointments, alphabetically and not in order of merits. Three months were given to complete the process.

Background

Efforts to break the deadlock between the West Bengal government and Governor Bose led the court to propose the constitution of a search-cum-selection committee for appointing vice-chancellors. However, the Court faced challenges in forming the committee as neither the governor nor the University Grants Commission (UGC) responded with nominees, as alleged by the state government.

This year, in April, the Court was informed that the Governor had agreed to fill up six vacancies of Vice Chancellors from the list recommended by the West Bengal Government. For the remaining vacancies, the Court asked the State Government to send recommendations.

Following this, the Court warned that it would appoint the VCs if the parties failed to do it amicably. The warning came after the court was informed that out of fifteen candidates' names given by the State for appointment as VCs (for fifteen universities), the Chancellor found seven persons to be unsuitable and did not consider the rest.

On May 18, the Court ordered that the remaining eight persons be appointed within one week. It also directed the state government to send about twelve to fifteen names of eminent persons for reconsideration by the chancellor. This direction was passed to fill the seven vacant positions (out of fifteen).

Case Title: State of West Bengal v. Dr. Sanat Kumar Ghosh & Ors. | Special Leave Petition (Civil) No. 17403 of 2023