NUJS Professor Shamnad Basheer resigns; VC Bhat says NUJS to recruit more teachers

Shamnad Basheer, Ministry of HRD Chair in IP Law at the National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata has resigned. He sent his resignation through email to the Vice Chancellor Ishwara Bhat on December 31..In his email, Basheer alleges that the VC had made misrepresentations before the NUJS Executive Committee with respect to the work of the IP Chair. Basheer states that the VC opposed his leave application on the false ground that ‘no credible work was being done on the IP Chair’ while he was away on leave to take care of his father’s health..Basheer had requested for leave without pay from August 1, 2013 till the end of Monsoon semester to which the VC had categorically pledged support. However, as per Basheer’s email, “the VC vehemently opposed my leave application, on the spurious ground that I had not performed and that no work was being done on the IP Chair.”.Basheer clarifies in the email that.“despite the fact that several documents submitted to your office more than amply indicated the range of high quality IP work (research, scholarship, policy and IP outreach) that was being undertaken on a continuous basis, my leave notwithstanding.” .Basheer further states, “I was extremely hurt and disillusioned with this misrepresentation and can no longer bring myself to trust you. I find no other reason for your stunning volte-face, than my constant questioning of your policies.” The professor relies on an e-mail sent by Bhat in which the Vice Chancellor agrees to “take up” Basheer’s request for leave. (Copy of e-mail below).He adds, “As several of my colleagues at NUJS know, I had taken serious issue with the unhealthy opacity that you unleashed at NUJS after taking charge. I was appalled at the way in which earlier policies that catapulted NUJS to the top of the academic league were reversed without due discussion and deliberation with your faculty colleagues.”.In his email, Basheer also writes that he had requested the VC time and again to refrain from, “being vindictive towards faculty colleagues who were not in his good books.”.Basheer, who is the founder of Increasing Diversity by Increasing Access (IDIA) project states, “Despite the IDIA project being incubated out of NUJS” the VC showed great hostility to the movement only because it was Basheer who had founded it. Basheer declined to comment when contacted by Bar & Bench..When contacted VC Bhat dismissed the allegations made by Basheer. As per the Vice Chancellor, the institute strongly supports IDIA and shall continue to do so. He also said that the Executive Council had eventually agreed to grant Basheer leave without pay. With respect to disallowing faculty interviews via Skype, the Vice Chancellor said that a Skype call could not replace a classroom presentation and hence rejected the proposal. At the same time, Prof. Bhat also said that there were plans to hire more faculty..When asked how one ought to deal with changes in faculty, the Vice Chancellor said that, “Wherever higher positions are available, [faculty] will go. That is something that cannot be prevented.”.The full text of Basheer’s email is below..Dear Prof Bhat:I hope this finds you well. I’ve been forwarded a note by the Hon’ble Registrar, informing me that the Executive Council (EC) kindly agreed to grant my leave (without pay) with retrospective effect, on grounds of my fathers’ terminal illness (cancer). I am deeply indebted to the EC members for their compassionate decision, owing to which I was able to spend some quality time with my father and take care of him. Fortunately, he recovered well and is much better now. I am particularly obliged to the EC members for arriving at this considerate decision, despite your misrepresentation to them on the work of the IP Chair. You had opposed my leave application on the alleged ground that no credible work was being done on the IP Chair. This, despite the fact that several documents submitted to your office more than amply indicated the range of high quality IP work (research, scholarship, policy and IP outreach) that was being undertaken on a continuous basis, my leave notwithstanding. As you are no doubt aware, the IP Chair was set up by the Ministry of HRD at various premier institutions including the National Law Schools, IIT’s and IIM’s to foster IP research, advanced IP teaching and to render high quality policy advice to the government from time to time. For the last 5 years of operation of the NUJS IP Chair, this has been done quite successfully, with the result that our chair is recognized as one of the leading IP chairs, with a reputation not only in India, but also abroad. The various annual reports submitted to your office and the Ministry of HRD bear ample testimony to this.In fact, when I requested you for leave, I made it a point to mention that I would not let the activities of the IP Chair suffer in my absence, and would attend government meetings and engage in various other IP activities as far as possible. This was also on record in my email to you requesting for the leave. I attach this email for your kind reference.Pursuant to that commitment, I made myself present in Delhi and various other places for government meetings whenever the occasion demanded, and as far as I could, throughout the tenure of my leave. In fact, as I began penning this email to you some days ago, I was in Chennai to render advisory services to the National Biodiversity Authority (NBA), a government agency with which I work extensively. I also engaged with University activities as best as I could and attended an Executive Council (EC) meeting at my own expense, whilst on leave. Please note that all this was done on leave without drawing any salary whatsoever. I attach an earlier email of yours, where you clearly indicated that you would support my application for leave. However, when the matter came up before the Executive Council (EC) meeting (which you chaired), you vehemently opposed my leave application, on the spurious ground that I had not performed and that no work was being done on the IP Chair.I was extremely hurt and disillusioned with this misrepresentation and can no longer bring myself to trust you. I find no other reason for your stunning volte-face, than my constant questioning of your policies. As several of my colleagues at NUJS know, I had taken serious issue with the unhealthy opacity that you unleashed at NUJS after taking charge. I was appalled at the way in which earlier policies that catapulted NUJS to the top of the academic league were reversed without due discussion and deliberation with your faculty colleagues. I had, time and again, requested you to take stronger note of the fact that we were losing top quality faculty and to initiate measures to stem this tide. In particular, I took issue with your refusal to grant a Skype interview to a very promising Indian scholar from the Netherlands, owing to which we effectively lost him to IIT Delhi. You will recollect that the Executive Council also took strong note of this and recommended that Skype interviews be granted to scholars who are unable to fly at short notice to Kolkata. Time and again, I urged you to refrain from being vindictive towards faculty colleagues who were not in your good books, not least because I happened to be one of them. Despite the Increasing Diversity by Increasing Access (IDIA) project being incubated out of NUJS, you showed great hostility to the movement only because I founded it. Today, this movement to empower underprivileged communities through legal education has made great progress, with 28 underprivileged scholars that we trained studying at the various National Law Universities (NLU’s). You refused to sign IDIA cheques, despite opinions from reputed tax experts in the country including leading senior counsel, Arvind Datar, who more than categorically opined that you could so sign without any impediment. This greatly hampered our operations and risked the future of several underprivileged scholars being trained by IDIA.You then reversed an earlier policy initiated by Prof MP Singh that all IDIA scholars would be granted a fee waiver, if admitted to NUJS. You stipulated that only one IDIA scholar would be granted this waiver. As a result of this change in policy, we had to send two of our most promising scholars (who merited admission to NUJS) to NLU Delhi, where Prof Ranbir Singh, the Vice Chancellor, went out of his way to support these underprivileged scholars, including offering them a fee waiver and laptops. After much thought and deliberation, I’ve decided that I cannot serve under your leadership anymore. Please treat this as my resignation letter, to take effect on the 6th of February, 2014.I write this with a very heavy heart, given how much NUJS and its students meant to me and what an intellectual exhilarating journey it was to work under the leadership of stalwarts such as Professor MP Singh. One of my friends asked me if I ever regret having cut short a promising academic career abroad to return to India. I think it was the best choice I ever made, not least because I was able to participate in the growth of one of the most promising Indian institutions and work with an exceptional group of academics to help unleash a number of educational innovations. In many ways, while NLS, Bangalore signalled a revolutionary era in Indian legal education, NUJS took it to the next level with its dynamic emphasis on research, scholarship and advancing the frontiers of legal knowledge. All of the petty politics and bureaucratic sluggishness that one encountered from time to time were more than made up by the passion, creativity and enthusiasm of our students, who are and will continue to remain our biggest asset. Borrowing a legendary line from a Bollywood classic (Deewar), my constant refrain has been: “Mere paas students hain”.I will miss my students dearly, as also my wonderful faculty colleagues and members of the administration and support staff, all of whom made my time at NUJS extremely memorable, treating me as one of their very own. Since I am on leave now, I will join the University on January 6th to wind up all pending work on the IP Chair from my end. If you need me to extend this date, or if there is any other work you wish me to undertake in the interim, including helping you locate a successor for the IP Chair, please do let me know.With the hope that NUJS will restore someday to its former glory and serve as a leading site for legal education and scholarship, I remainMost sincerely yours,Shamnad Basheer