Director (Closure)

Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad [IIIT-A] was established in the year 1999. Dr. M. D. Tiwari was its first Director and he glorified this post till January, 2014. In January 2014, Prof. Gora Chand Nandi became Director-in-charge. This was also the beginning of the era oppression and mismanagement in the IIIT-A. During his tenure as Director-in-charge, one PIL was also filed against Prof. Nandi that he is not applying his mind while taking certain policy decisions. The PIL was disposed with an instruction to Prof. Somenath Biswas, the then Director (Designate) that he would review the decision taken by Prof. Nandi.

Prof. Biswas has joined as Director, IIIT-A on 1^st of May, 2015. It was expected that a person like him who is from IIT, Kanpur would bring dynamism in the management and administration of IIIT-A. There was a hopeful environment prevailing in the IIIT-A campus. But soon people started to realize that their good days would require some more time to come. Prof. Biswas has also joined the same league which Prof. Gora Chand Nandi had started. He also made a coterie of a few favorites and started playing nepotism. Let us introspect the activities of Prof. Somenath as Director.

The first programme to close was MS-CLIS Programme. MS-CLIS was a very popular and unique programme of IIIT-A. This programme was having a huge demand among the students. The utility of this programme can also be understood from the placement statistics of the students. The programme was a unique blending of law and information security. The popularity of the programme can also be viewed from the ratio of applications to the actual number of students admitted. Prof. G.C. Nandi, after becoming the Director-in-charge, has closed this programme. Upon closure of MS-CLIS programme, one ex-student of from IIITA had filed a PIL in Allahabad High Court. The High Court had disposed this PIL with a remark that it would be wrong to presuppose at this stage that the new Director who was about to join would not apply his mind and review the decisions taken by Prof. Gora Chand Nandi. The teachers and students of MS-CLIS had a very high hope from Prof. Biswas that he would definitely not allow to let this programme die its unnatural death. But on the contrary, he had not done anything to restore such a unique programme and allowed the closure of MS-CLIS.

When it is asked on various platforms about closure of this programme, he used to say that it has been upgraded to M.Tech (CLIS). I would like to remind you that M. Tech is only for the GATE qualified students and there is no place for the students coming from law background.   

The second programme to be closed was Bio-Medical Engineering. Similar to MS-CLIS, bio-medical engineering was also one of the very successful programme of IIIT-A. But Prof. Biswas had himself proposed for the closure of this programme and get it approved in Academic Council and other statutory bodies.  

Within three months of his joining as Director, Prof. Somenath Biswas has got it approved in the BOM to close the Discovery Park Project. Discovery Park was a scheme conceptualized in the year 2009 in the Amethi campus of IIIT-A popularly known as RGIIT. It was a scheme indented to provide the benefits of latest information technology to the farmers. For this project a group of scientists and other employees were also recruited. The project was functioning at the institute’s Amethi campus efficiently. But to everybody’s surprise, this project was closed abruptly in July, 2014. Almost eight numbers of scientists and employees engaged in the project were terminated. The argument given in favour of closing of Discovery Park Project was that it was a project related to agriculture and IIIT, Allahabad is in no way connected with agriculture. But the fact is that it was a project to disseminate the benefit of latest technology to the farmers. Here, I would like to ask to all concerned that does IT means only computers? Have we not reducing the meaning of IT only to the level of computers. In true sense, any technology related to generating and disseminating information is IT. Moreover, why so much of cruelty to the employees who were engaged in this project and many of them were the sole bread winner for their family.    

The extent of oppression and mismanagement was such that the employees were terminated without any fault on their part. Further, in the constituency of Mr. Rahul Gandhi (As well as your constituency), which is politically so active, the employees were debarred from all kinds of employee benefits like gratuity etc. Some of the employees are still fighting for their gratuity from the Director, but the Director has issued an office memorandum that gratuity is not payable to the employees who has joined after 31-12-2003. Thus, he has also made a government notification himself which is actually not issued by the government anytime in the past. It is well-known that gratuity is payable to even temporary employee who have completed five year in the same organisation.  

After the closure of Discovery Park, the next project to be closed was High Court of Allahabad Digitalization Project. As many as 10 numbers of employees were engaged in this project. The project was yet to complete. But the Director has closed this project and 10 numbers of employees employed in the project were made jobless overnight. These employees had taken the shelter of High Court, but they could not get any relief from the court on the ground that they were project staff. But here the question is who will compensate the time and effort given by these employees for the institute? Since they were the temporary staff so they could not get any relief from the court, but was it really essential to terminate them as the project was moving nicely without affecting the normal course of activities of the institute? Or was it not the responsibility of the institute to absorb them in some other projects or in some other work? We live in a country which claims it to be a welfare state. What has happened to the concept of welfare state? All the political parties are silent on this issue who claims themselves to be the MASIHA of masses. But since the number of employees are very small none of the political parties are interested in their issue. Should we assume that these political parties as well as political leaders are also interested in TRP like many media house?    

Besides, the closure of academic programmes and projects, the well-known event like Science Conclave has also been closed by Prof. Somenath Biswas. IIIT-A was known all over the world for organizing conference of Nobel lariats, popularly known as science conclave. In the first six science conclaves organized by the institute, the participants which consists of teachers and students and researchers from more than 30 countries had participated. In short, it was the pride of the IIIT-A. Everybody right from the ministry to the academia has appreciated the faculty, staff and students of IIIT-A for this grand event. But Prof. Somenath Biswas has declared that this conclave would no longer be organized in the IIIT-A in future.

The above were the description of academic programmes, projects and events which were already closed by him. In addition to these, the situation of MBA-IT Programme of the institute is also very critical. IIIT-A has started MBA-IT programme in the year 2005 and since then it was one of the leading and most demanding MBA programme in the country which can be vouched from the number of awards won by the programme. The total intake capacity for the programme was 76. But Prof. Biswas in collaboration with Madhavendra Misra has conspired to close this programme. It can be verified from the number of admissions taken in the programme. In the year 2014 total number of students admitted in the programme was only 21 against the intake capacity of 76, in the year 2015, only 07 and in the year 2016 only 06 (this is not a printing error) numbers of students has taken admission. In the Management department, all the academic and administrative decisions are taken by him and his coterie members and the senior most teachers are not even consulted for their opinion on any matters.

The appointments of 16 teachers have been cancelled by the BOM and they have fought the case in the Allahabad High Court. Their Writ petitions are allowed by the court, but still they are not allowed to join. Allahabad High Court has issued notice of contempt of court to Prof. Somenath Biswas. But some of the Professors have influenced him for not to take Contempt of Court seriously. In the discovery park project eight numbers of employees were terminated. In the high court project 10 numbers of employees were terminated. In addition to this, Dr. C.V.S. Shiva Prasad has also been terminated when his case is still pending in the court. In the 15^th meeting of the BOM, it was also decided that the appointment of the teachers made in the year 2011 and 2012 is also liable to be quashed.

Recently show cause notice have been issued to all the employees who were appointed in the year 2011, 2012 and 2013 to cancel their appointment. Their number is almost 30.

All these employees were called for an interaction with the Chancellor’s nominee to show the validity of their appointments. Probably it also happens for the first time in the history of India that a person selected by a selection committee and already joined his/her services are asked to appear for interview before another selection committee without any fault of them and many teachers have appeared due to fear. All the appointees from 2011-13 (almost 30 in number) are asked to appear before the chancellor’s nominee at IIT Kanpur.

Interestingly, all this exercise is being done in the name of Chancellor’s nominee but when Chancellor has been asked about this he clearly denies his role in the entire process and thus, makes entire process suspicious.

In the last year, institute has spent exorbitantly high amount to fight court cases. It is almost 60 lakh. This much of the wastage of tax-payers money to throw someone from their job and snatch bread and butter from their mouth. This is also not seen till today in India.    

A cost to the inefficient management and wastage of money is also born by the student community. Prof. Biswas has closed one of the canteen meant for the students. There is a canteen in the IIIT Campus in which earlier some subsidy was given by the institute to the students. Thus, students used to get quality food at reasonable prices. But since the Institute has wasted most of the money in useless court cases, therefore, the subsidy has been closed for the students. Now students have to pay more for the same food.

I want to ask this question to all the people from intelligentsia as why our media and government is only active I someone commits suicide? Why we have to wait till that moment? Almost 40 number of employees in IIITA is on the verge of committing suicide and there are many who are facing oppression but the MHRD and media, all are keeping mum and waiting for some unpleasant development. 

The above points has been presented to clarify that the present Director is practically working day and night to close the institute as if his designation is not Director, IIITA rather it is Director (Closure). His only agenda is to close whatever is running in the institute. It seems that he has been appointed by the ministry to close this institute. If this is true then his performance as Director (Closure) is remarkable in almost two year. In the last one and half year he has worked as the puppet of some of his coterie members and practiced only nepotism. He has shown that he not only lacks mind in running of administration but he does not has a good heart also. Now it for us to extrapolate that if he could close so many things in one and half year than in his entire tenure how much he would be successful in closing the other programmes in general and the institute in particular. All these can be verified by the decreasing number of enrollment of students in various programmes in the institute in the last two year.

I am sure all these things have been informed to the ministry on various platforms. When the ministry will take all these seriously? Why we do not take actions proactively and wait for committing suicide by someone? And I must remind you that situation prevailing in IIIT, Allahabad is very frustrating and provoking for committing suicide as almost 30 number of employees were given show cause notice for termination of their services and their families have lost their night sleep due to this.

I request you to kindly take this issue sympathetically and seriously and interfere in the matter of IIITA otherwise it is apprehended that something unpleasant might happen and we all will be held responsible for this.  

  

I would like to urge the intelligentsia to take a note of this and we should protest at our own level to prevent this unethical practices practiced by Prof. Somenath Biswas.

WE WANT PROF. BISWAS TO COMMENT ON THESE POINTS IN THE OPEN FORUM IF HE HAS SOMETHING TO JUSTIFY OTHERWISE IT WILL BE ASSUMED THAT HE HAS NOTHING TO SAY AND HE IS ACCEPTING ALL THESE POINTS.