NEW DELHI : President A. P. J. Abdul Kalam has sought the views of the Union Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry on the report of the fact-finding committee on the Mahatma Gandhi Antarrashtriya Hindi Vishwavidyalaya, which found Vice-Chancellor G. Gopinathan incapable of providing academic leadership to the fledgling institution.

Submitted in June, the Ministry apparently forwarded the report to the President — who is the Visitor — without any comment. Now, the President wants the Ministry to take a position on the report.

11 recommendations

While sending the report back, the President, however, has not drawn attention to any of the 11 recommendations made by the committee, headed by historian Bipan Chandra.

The committee has blamed the HRD Ministry for many of the ills that plague the Vishwavidyalaya, set up in 1997 by an Act of Parliament.

While stating that it still had the potential to be a "path-breaking university which would advance the frontiers of knowledge in Hindi," it noted that it could not "take off because of the totally negative attitude of the Ministry towards it and the obstacles placed in its path by HRD, particularly during the tenure of the first Vice-Chancellor."

The committee also found fault with Prof. Gopinathan — second Vice-Chancellor — who "is not capable of reviving the university and providing academic leadership and administrative skill of the order required for realising the vision of the makers of the Act founding it."

While maintaining that the university did not at this stage need a Pro-Vice-Chancellor (PVC), the committee said "keeping in view the inadequacies of Prof. Gopinathan, a PVC with a strong academic background and administrative ability from any discipline should be provided to the university."

Since November 2004, Prof. Gopinathan has been under instruction from the HRD Ministry not to take any major policy decision, pending enquiry. Soon after taking charge in May 2004, the Ministry began the process of instituting an enquiry into the functioning of the Vishwavidyalaya following complaints about its functioning.

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