Valson Thampu plan criticised, meet postponed

A meeting of St. Stephen’s College governing body has been postponed as teachers criticised a proposal by principal Valson Thampu that aims to amend the college’s 102-year-old constitution. The proposal was to be tabled at the meeting.

Mr Thampu had proposed amendments, including granting power to the principal to take disciplinary action against any student or staff, irrespective of the governing body’s opinion. The draft also proposed giving a major say to the Church of North India in the functioning of the college.

The college’s supreme council, which consists of six members of the Church of North India, will get authority over the students’ admissions and appointment of faculty.

“The draft was supposed to be placed before the governing body in a meeting scheduled on November 23, but that meeting was today postponed,” a senior college official said told PTI although he did not elaborate on the reason behind the postponement.

The teachers at the college claimed that the draft was prepared without consulting them and would pave the way for “dictatorial” functioning and also make the institution inaccessible for “non-Christian” students and faculty. Duta president Nandita Narain, mathematics professor at college, said, “This attempt by Thampu at the tail-end of his tenure is aimed at eliminating any kind of democratic set up in college. From admissions to appointments, the elected bodies will have no say in it and, on top of it, the principal will be the sole disciplinary action-taking authority.” Prof. Thampu, however, claimed that it is the supreme council’s decision to amend the constitution and there is no violation of procedures or law in the same. “Whatever has been proposed is very much within the ambit of the law. I can challenge anyone to find any legal or procedural loophole in the same,” he said.

Prof. Thampu, who will retire in February after completing a nine-year ten-ure full of controversies, proposed to empower the principal to take disciplinary action against studen-ts or staff, independent of the governing body, which till now had a say in the matter. The amendment also plans to replace St. Stephen’s College Trust, which currently runs the college, with a proposed St. Stephen’s Educational Society which will have the power to establish St. Stephen’s-like private institutions across India.

As per the draft, the governing body will have to “control the policy, development and direction of the institution and administer the finances and control the income and expenditure of the institution.”

It has also been proposed to remove the minimum teaching experience needed for an applicant to apply for the post of principal, to increase the powers of the principal and the supreme council and to reduce the number of teacher representatives in the governing body by half.