Even as the State government is going through a severe financial crisis and finding it difficult to garner resources for its day-to-day affairs, the State has been dragging its feet after issuing an order to take action against illegal promotions made at Kerala Agricultural University (KAU) and recover excess emoluments drawn by the candidates with effect from the date of promotion.
Interestingly, the order was issued on September 11 by then Agriculture Production Commissioner and Principal Secretary (Agriculture) B. Ashok, who now holds the post of the University Vice- Chancellor. Despite being legally bound to implement the order issued by him and knowing the issue inside out, he is yet to implement the order, arguably due to the pressure from service organisations. As per the government order, illegal promotions are to be cancelled along with the recovery of excess perks drawn by the faculty within three months after the issuance of the order.
In case the university fails to comply with the order after three months, the enhanced pay disbursed to ineligible candidates should be deducted from the non-plan assistance until full compliance is confirmed, according to the order. Now, with hardly two weeks left for the deadline, the university is facing the prospect of non-plan assistance to it being reduced. Notably, the KAU recently mortgaged its prime land to avail of a ₹40-crore loan to meet its daily expenses.
Committee suggestions
According to the government order, a Financial Inspection Wing (FIW) in the State government identified irregularities in the promotion of teachers in 2014 under the Career Advancement Scheme (CAS). Based on the FIW report, a committee headed by Mr. Ashok was constituted to look into the issue and cancel the promotions accorded irregularly. The committee recommended to the government to initiate urgent measures to rectify the anomalies related to CAS promotions and avoid them in the future.
According to sources, there are teachers who have acquired PhDs from institutions not recognised by Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), and were promoted to higher posts on the basis of illegal PhDs. Further, there are also teachers in the cadre of professors who have not handled a single class in the past 15 years. Without taking a single class and guiding a single student, these teachers are now enjoying the perks attached to professor posts.
Service forums intervene
Mr. Ashok said only a few teachers were illegally promoted. When the university initiated steps to implement the order, representatives of service organisations intervened and argued that the government order was issued without taking note of a 2011 Supreme Court order in this regard. However, they have not provided anything to prove their claims. “It was delaying a tactic. Now the university is planning to implement the order at the earliest,” he said.
