‘Govt went back on Jayalalithaa's words, eased me out as vice-chancellor’

CHENNAI: More than a year after she retired as vice-chancellor of Tamil Nadu Music and Fine Arts University, Veena E Gayathri has blamed the present state government for easing her out of the post despite former chief minister J Jayalalithaa having assured her a three-year extension.
“When I received death threats in 2016, the CM called me. She told me my term as VC has been extended by three years. Senior AIADMK leaders were witness to this.But things took a U-turn after her hospitalisation and death. The extension was not put on record and I had to leave in November 2016,” says Gayathri.
The university was without a VC till January 31, 2018, when Prameela Gurumurthy was appointed after a search committee proposed her name.
Gayathri blames the search committee headed by musician Sudha Raghunathan and former Madras University vice-chancellor S P Thyagarajan for her exit.
“They introduced new rules and tweaked things to make my extension difficult. They made PhD qualification compulsory for VCs, though I am recognised by Prasar Bharathi as an ‘A’ grader. If PhD was a criterion for being VC, I shouldn't have been given the post earlier,” she said.
The government and the search committee head, however, said there was no merit in Gayathri’s argument.
“The search committee went purely by the merit of the candidate,” said minister for Tamil official language and Tamil culture K Pandiarajan.
“According to UGC norms, a VC must have a PhD and should have served as a professor for 10 years in a university. Gayathri doesn't meet these norms. There is no doubt she is a great musician and a child prodigy, but the Tamil Nadu government went by what the panel proposed and they decided to have Prameela on board. Our aim was not to insult Gayathri,” the minister said.
Sudha Raghunathan said the search committee members only proposed the names and that the final decision was made by the Tamil Nadu government.
“Where is the record that Jayalalithaa had given a verbal assurance? Do you think we would have gone against Jayalalithaa's wishes? I am not running for the post, so I can't be blamed for being partial,” she said.
Gayathri, meanwhile, is not one to give up. She says she has taken up the matter with governor Banwarilal Purohit, besides approaching chief minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and deputy chief minister O Panneerselvam.
The veena exponent said the university was languishing without the planned expansion.
“We were supposed to move to a new place in Shollinganallur in November 2016, but due to vaastu reasons, Jayalalithaa wanted the expansion to be done on the present campus itself,” Gayathri said.
“She was so certain about my capabilities and had entrusted me with more responsibilities, but things began to go haywire after she fell ill,” she added.