ONE OF THE MANY promises made by the Trinamool Congress (TMC) party in the run-up to the 2011 assembly elections in West Bengal was a pledge to œdepoliticise higher education. Accordingly, in May 2011 after TMC routed the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM)-led Left Front government which had (mis) ruled West Bengal (pop. 91 million) for 34 years during which it ruined the state™s once much-envied higher education system, TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee promptly abolished the packed-with-leftists Executive Council inherited by the state™s showpiece Presidency University (PU).
An apolitical 10-member Presidency Mentor Group (PMG) was constituted, chaired by Dr. Sugata Bose, Harvard University™s Gardiner Professor of Oceanic History and South Asia Affairs, and enonomics Nobel laureate Dr. Amartya Sen, among others. Shortly thereafter, Cambridge (UK) alum Malabika Sarkar, then professor of English at Jadavpur University and a renowned Milton scholar, was appointed PU vice chancellor.
However in end-March, Dr. Sugata Bose dropped a bombshell in West Bengal™s groves of academia by announcing his candidature for the Lok Sabha elections from Kolkata™s Jadavpur constituency on a Trinamool ticket. Although the chairmanship of PMG is a non-statutory honorary position, it nevertheless commands great prestige and is ranked above the office of vice chancellor of PU. Therefore in no time at all, Bose was embroiled in a huge controversy. According to his critics, Bose, who had promised to cleanse PU of politics, has done just the opposite.
Reacting to Bose™s candidature, the PU Students™ Union called a referendum to determine whether Bose had breached his unwritten commitment to depoliticise the university. On March 29, 1,524 of PU™s 2,135 students voted on the issue. Counting on April 1 revealed that 1,208 students wanted him to quit, with only 316 voting in favour of his retaining PMG chairmanship.
Comments Nirmalya Mukherjee, general secretary of the PU Students Union: œDr. Bose has been given a ticket by the ruling TMC. He is therefore a member of the party and is no longer apolitical. When she formed the PMG, chief minister Mamata Banerjee had promised that no one with a political identity would be a member of the group. She cannot go back on her word. The chairman of the mentors cannot have any political affiliation.
With Bose showing no sign of heeding the students™ protests, union spokespersons have resolved to seek appointments with the VC and the chancellor, when the demand for Bose™s resignation will be pressed. However, Bratya Basu, minister of higher education, isn™t impressed. œThe students™ referendum has no validity. Isn™t the prime minister functioning as chancellor of Central universities although he is a political figure? he asks rhetorically.
Meanwhile, it™s business as usual in PU. Vice chancellor Sarkar™s tenure ends on May 15. As we go to press, she has confirmed that she won™t seek a second term and that Anuradha Lohia, professor of biochemistry at Kolkata™s S.N. Bose Research Institute, has been appointed her successor.
Sujoy Gupta (Kolkata)