by: Vaibhav Ganjapure
The Maharashtra government has finally issued a circular on Friday directing all non-agriculture universities to immediately cancel all appointments, promotions and increments made on the basis of degrees obtained from Meghalaya-based Chandra Mohan Jha (CMJ) University.
The moves comes after TOI reported the CJM University’s modus operandi and how it ‘sold’ thousands of fake degrees to students across the country, including over 4,000 PhDs, for anywhere between Rs2 lakh and Rs5 lakh. Most of these degrees are believed to be sold in Maharashtra.
Taking serious cognisance of TOI report on the fake degree racket being run by Meghalaya-based university, state higher and technical education minister Rajesh Tope had assured TOI that the government would issue a circular asking all universities to lodge criminal offences against beneficiary students of CMJ university who obtained degrees by fraudulent means.
The circular by state higher and technical department officer Pramod Kanade has directed vice-chancellors of all non-agriculture universities to conduct a thorough scrutiny of doctoral degrees submitted by all lecturers in their affiliated/conducted colleges and certify them.
Citing Section 8(4) of Maharashtra Universities Act, 1994, the circular asked the universities to lodge police complaints against lecturers/employees found to be appointed on such bogus degrees in affiliated/conducted colleges through the officers who appointed them.
The VCs were also directed to find out the lecturers/employees who had obtained degrees from other private universities like CMJ and check their validity and reliability, and take action. The circular warned the universities against appointing candidates having PhD/MPhil degrees from CMJ as lecturers.
The government mentioned that CMJ had failed to adhere to norms of awarding PhD/MPhil degrees as per University Grants Commission (UGC) rules.
Tope had told TOI that similar instructions were also issued to joint directors of technical education of all regions to immediately stop salaries of such lecturers if they were found to possess bogus degrees.
This article was written by Vaibhav Ganjapure and originally published on indiatimes
