- Jolt to Jamia varsity after mistake
CHARU SUDAN KASTURI
New Delhi, March 5: President Pratibha Patil has challenged the validity of honorary doctorates awarded by Jamia Millia Islamia last year to actors Shabana Azmi and Naseeruddin Shah and others, accusing the university of violating rules.
The President’s office has returned the university’s plea for post-facto recognition to the degrees, asking why Patil — the Visitor to central universities — was ignored earlier, government officials have said.
Without the President’s approval, the degrees have no official sanctity.
The President’s refusal to unquestioningly rubber-stamp a process where her prior approval is required has left the human resource development ministry red-faced and struggling for explanations to offer to the highest office of the land.
The ministry is responsible for Jamia, a central university, and the President’s office has asked it to explain why rules were violated in granting the degrees.
Jamia vice-chancellor Mushirul Hasan is currently abroad and could not be reached on his phone.
Two senior officers, however, independently confirmed to The Telegraph that the President’s charges were accurate but claimed the controversy was the result of an honest error.
The President’s office, in its note to the HRD ministry last week, has cited statute 29(1) of the rules that accompany the Jamia Millia Islamia act governing the university.
The statute allows the university executive council to recommend names of eminent personalities that Jamia wishes to grant honoris causa (Latin for honorary) degrees.
But the council’s recommendation must be approved by the Visitor — the President of India — before the degrees can be awarded. All central academic institutions need to follow the same process.
Jamia, however, had awarded the degrees at its convocation on October 31 last year without even seeking the President’s approval.
Besides Shabana and Naseeruddin, the university honoured art scholar Kapila Vatsyayan and Asghar Ali Engineer, a Muslim scholar known for his work on liberation theology in Islam.
Jamia sought the consent only in January, Patil’s office has said in its note.
The HRD ministry and Jamia, sources said, are keen to avoid a scenario where they have to ask the awardees to return the honours. “That would be a public embarrassment that will leave a stain which would be hard to remove for several years,” a Jamia official said.
But not paying heed to the President’s concerns is not an option.
The HRD ministry, sources said, plans to write to the President’s office saying that the breach of rules was an “inadvertent lapse” on the part of Jamia.
It will request the President to pardon Jamia and recognise the degrees that, officials admit, would otherwise remain invalid.
Top academic institutions, including central universities and even the Indian Institutes of Technology, are increasingly queuing up to grant honorary degrees at their convocation ceremonies, ministry officials said.
Former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam has received over 30 honorary doctorates and possibly tops the list of Indians with the highest number of such degrees.
Atomic energy chief Anil Kakodkar’s popularity for the degrees peaked after the Indo-US nuclear deal.
At least two IITs — in Mumbai and Kharagpur — have awarded industrialist Ratan Tata honorary degrees.
Actor Amitabh Bachchan was awarded an honorary doctorate in 2006 by his alma mater, Delhi University.
When Lal Bahadur Shastri died, there were a number of people who clamoured for the PMs post. To avoid a break-up of the Congress, Morarji Desai, Kamraj and Nijligappa decided to put a puppet in the chair hoping to pull the strings from behind.They installed Indira Gandhi.
However, Indira, with the help of young Turks Chandrashekar and Mohan Dharia turned the tables on the Syndicate and formally installed and strengthened her hands to become such a force in Asia that Bangladesh was snatched out of Pakistan's hand. That wound is still festering in Pakistan which is resulting in terrorist activities like Mumbai.
It is another matter that yesterday's young Turk became just as corrupt when he became the PM for just a few days.
In the new found courage of Pratibha Patil are we seeing a new Indira Gandhi developing.
Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh and the Congress better watch out.
History has a knack of repeating itself.
Radheshyam
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