Nagpur University, finally, hands over librarian's case to Disciplinary Action Committee

NAGPUR: The Nagpur University has finally handed over the case of senior NU lecturer allegedly helping her sister to clear her exams, to its Disciplinary Action Committee (DAC). The controller of examinations (CoE) Siddharth Kane, who had given a "clean chit" to the head of NU's Department of Library and Information Science (DLISc) Shailini Likhitkar, told media about this development. TOI had on August 2 reported this issue.

"After conducting initial probe we have decided to handover the case to DAC as per rules and regulations," Kane said. He explained that after TOI report, NU had initiated a probe and sought Likhitkar's explanation on the allegations.

"In her reply, she stated that she was on leave at the time of the examination but NU officials had asked her to check the answer sheets. She said that she didn't have any information about the answer sheets that were being revaluated and had absolutely no idea that her sister's answer-sheet was among the lot she checked," Kane said.

Interestingly, while refuting the allegations, the CoE had termed the entire episode as an "act of mischief by someone". Likhitkar however couldn't be contacted for her comments.

The fraud came to fore after a person, TS Gedam, wrote to vice-chancellor, Vilas Sapkal, alleging that Likhitkar had helped her sister (Roll No. 108993) to clear Bachelor of Library Science (BLib) examination conducted in 2010-11 through unfair means. The letter claimed that Likhitkar herself checked the answer-sheets of her sister during revaluation and increased her marks in two subjects so as to enable her to clear the examinations.

The letter further mentioned that she had misused her position and failed to inform the university that her sister was appearing in the examination, thus violating rules.

The letter claimed that when her sister completed her Certificate Course in Library Science in 2008, she (Roll No. 171026) was declared failed and but she subsequently cleared her next exam with the help of Likhitkar. She had even visited MJ College when MLib practicals were being conducted in March and asked the college authorities to personally pay attention to her sister. The student is now doing her Masters in Library Science (MLib).

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