THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The conflict between Governor Arif Mohammad Khan and the state administration appears to be escalating anew. After the state government invited the governor to give the policy address and the governor, in return, invited the chief minister and other ministers to a Republic Day feast at the Raj Bhavan, it had seemed as though the conflict was settling down.

The conflict appears to be escalating after the government decided to form a search committee for the appointment of the VC of the Malayalam University as per the provisions of the bill passed by the assembly to curtail the powers of the governor as the chancellor. It must be noted that the Governor has not signed this bill. This is an exceptional move on the part of the government because a bill passed by the legislature won't become law until the governor signs it. On Wednesday, Higher Education Principal Secretary wrote to the Governor's Principal Secretary requesting him to nominate the Chancellor's representative to the search committee immediately.

Govt has upper hand in search committee
As per the bill passed by the assembly, the composition of the Search-cum-Selection Committee for the appointment of VC was changed to include two additional representatives of the state government. At present, the search committee consists of representatives of the Governor, UGC, and University Senate. With the inclusion of the Vice-Chairman of the Council of Higher Education as committee convener and another person named by the government, the search committee will have five members. This means that the government will have three representatives including the convener. In the past, if there wasn't agreement among the panel's three members, they could submit three-member panels separately. According to the amended bill, only one list shall be submitted by the majority decision of the committee. The chancellor should make the appointment from this list within one month. With this, the governor will not be able to enforce his decision on the appointment of the Vice-Chancellor. The age limit of the Vice Chancellor has also been raised from 60 to 65 years. Meanwhile, the Raj Bhavan informed that it has not received a letter requesting to nominate the Governor's representative to the search committee.

Persuasive moves failing?

The Governor personally invited the Chief Minister and the Ministers for the feast at Raj Bhavan on January 26th. Although the CM and other ministers were invited to the Christmas celebration at Raj Bhavan, they did not attend the celebration. The government has sanctioned Rs 15 lakhs for the Republic Day feast. The government has also decided to avoid the points criticizing the central government as much as possible in the governor's policy address speech so that the governor will not have much difficulty in delivering the speech. The new conflict comes amidst these persuasive moves.