‘Appoint vigilance officer at IIT-Kgp’

The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) has directed the government to appoint a full-time chief vigilance officer (CVO) at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Kharagpur

The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) has directed the government to appoint a full-time chief vigilance officer (CVO) at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Kharagpur after a senior professor doubling up as CVO was found running a fake institute, thereby misusing the IIT campus and brand.

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The CVC — India’s apex anti-corruption watchdog — has twice written to the HRD ministry directing it to appoint a full-time CVO at the IIT, citing the fake institute scam exposed by HT on October 18, 2010, top government sources told this newspaper.

No other IIT or central higher educational institution has a full-time CVO, and professors are asked to double up as
the institutions' top vigilance officers.

But a series of scams at IIT Kharagpur, and particularly the fake institute run by aerospace engineering professor Amit Kumar Ghosh — while he was the CVO — have forced the CVC to direct a special case for one of the the oldest premier
engineering schools of the country.

Ghosh, officials said, used his post as the CVO to cover up the scam, under which an unrecognised institute called
the Institute of Electrical Engineers duped poor students by offering them courses
with no validity.

Ghosh — who has also accused two former IIT directors — is currently on bail, and at least a dozen other former or current faculty and employees are under the scanner.

These include IIT registrar TK Ghoshal, who remains in his post despite documents that suggest that he aided in the fraud. Ghoshal and others too are under cloud but they have denied the charges.

Repeated irregularities also suggest the need of a dedicated CVO, sources said.

The recurrent irregularities started with the IIT repeatedly changing its stance on the formula it claims to
have used to arrive at the 2006 Joint Entrance Examination cut-offs, and also include a secret and illegal faculty quota (exposed first by HT on July 27, 2010).