2 more profs named in IIT racket

Investigations against Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur professor Amit Kumar Ghosh for running a fake institute from the campus have thrown up evidence that suggests at least two other senior IIT professors may have been involved. Charu Sudan Kasturi reports.

Investigations against Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur professor Amit Kumar Ghosh for running a fake institute from the campus have thrown up evidence that suggests at least two other senior IIT professors may have been involved.

HT Image

Police are examining papers that suggest that Professor Yash Pal Singh, head of department of electrical engineering in 1996, accepted a request to join the unrecognised institute as an "advisor," sources close to the probe said. Singh, now retired, is on the boards of some private institutions based near Delhi, sources said.

Investigators are not ruling out the possibility of other IIT faculty or administrators coming under their scanner.

These revelations come even as duped students of the unrecognised institute — called the Institute of Electrical Engineers (IEE) — have appealed to chief vigilance commission PJ Thomas to launch a probe against the guilty.

The students have also written to human resource development minister Kapil Sibal seeking a CBI probe. "Kindly look into the matter and give justice to us, the effected students. We really belong to poor families (sic)," the letter said.

Students of the unrecognised institute complained to IIT Kharagpur director Damodar Acharya and the police about how they were being duped by Ghosh and others at the IEE. Each student was charged R 27,000 for the course and the diplomas claimed — falsely —an association with the IIT.

Ghosh has also accused two former IIT Kharagpur directors — Kasturi Lal Chopra and Shishir Kumar Dube — of sanctioning the functioning of the fraudulent institution, a charge both Chopra and Dube have denied.

The fresh documents include a letter from Yash Pal Singh to the IEE dated December 24, 1996, stating his acceptance of the post of "advisor" on the Advisory Board of the institution, sources said.

JC Biswas, a professor of the electronics and electrical communications at IIT Kharagpur, also figures in the documents under the police's scrutiny.