Mamata Banerjee’s taking over the chancellorship of all state-run universities in West Bengal is being seen as a direct challenge to the Raj Bhavan, and an attempt to enforce more political control over the universities.
“The act of making the governor chancellor of universities was done to safeguard the autonomy of the universities from political control. This action (Banerjee's taking over) is nothing but to control the university from state headquarters,” said Pabitra Sarkar, former vice-chancellor of Rabindra Bharati University.
The reason behind Banerjee’s open challenge to Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar is the latter's “overactivism”. As chancellor, Dhankhar used to call meetings of vice-chancellors at Raj Bhavan. He also used to show-cause a couple of vice-chancellors for alleged irregularities in the universities.
Most of the vice-chancellors refused to attend the meetings. Some of them privately told the governor that the education minister asked them not to go without the chief minister's approval.
An unfazed Dhankhar asked the VCs to explain the reason behind their absence. VCs were caught between the constitutional head and executive head of the state.
Banerjee’s decision is a continuation of the clash as Raj Bhavan refused to confirm whether the governor himself relinquished the job and asked the chief minister to take over.
A few other states like Kerala and Maharashtra have seen a similar situation in the past.
The West Bengal government will have to bring a legislation in state assembly. But experts believe that such a legislation is bound to be under the scrutiny of law.
“The bill would go to the governor. He (the governor) would have three options. Either he would sign the bill, or he can send it to the Union government to know whether it goes with the spirit of the Constitution ( as UGC funds the universities) or he will not sign and the bill will lapse,” said Amal Mukhopadhyay, academician and constitutional expert.