The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Department head told to go on leave

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 09, 2007
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Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Department head told to go on leave

G. Mahadevan

Kerala University Syndicate endorses committee report

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Syndicate of the University of Kerala has decided to ask the Head of the Department of Biotechnology V. Thankamani to proceed on leave following its endorsement on Thursday of the report of a five-member committee that inquired into complaints by students regarding the running of the department.

The Head of the Department of Botany G.M. Nair has been given temporary additional charge as head of the Department of Biotechnology. The Syndicate also decided to appoint guest lecturers at the department to improve its functioning.

The inquiry committee in its report noted that classes for the M.Sc. students at the department were being held in the verandah even though a suitable room was available for this purpose.

The committee also discovered that the laboratories were occupied by students from other colleges/ private institutions for their M.Sc./B.Tech. projects. These students told the committee that they had paid Rs.2,000 for a month as fee for using the facilities. However, no accounts of the transactions were found at the department, the report notes.

"The committee also noticed that the HoD herself had printed cash receipts for receiving payments for the department, but no stock register of cash receipts were maintained. The students were denied cash receipts for payments of fees made to the HoD and SC/ST category of students too were not spared," the report said.

It also found that books were purchase and kept in almirahs without any entries in the accession register.

The department did not conduct examinations as per the Credit and Semester System rules. Question papers for various examinations were not printed and were read out in class by research students. The students were not provided answer sheets to write the examinations, the report said.

During its inspection on March 5, the committee members found that computers and accessories, including printers and photostat machines purchased by the department many years ago, were kept unopened beneath tables. Likewise equipment were found unused.

The university was also reportedly preparing to frame a memo of charges against Dr. Thankamani.

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