Anna University's move to formalise appointment of emeritus professors faces opposition

CHENNAI: To overcome huge backlog of vacancies and dearth in quality faculty members, Anna University has decided to utilise expertise of retired professors from the university, IITs and other eminent institutions. A resolution recently passed by the institute syndicate sought to standardise the quality and experience of faculty members and appoint retired professors on temporary basis.
However, the move now faces opposition from PMK founder S Ramadoss who alleged that it would block the employment of young faculty members. "When the university is having 40% vacancies, it is taking steps to appoint retired professors," he said asking the state government to advise the university to drop the move. Owing to no recruitment in the past six years, the number of vacancies across various departments has reached 320 out of 851 posts on the four campuses.
"There is a dearth of experienced faculty members in most of the departments. The university has been appointing emeritus professors and professors eminence in research centres and departments even before the present vice-chancellor took charge," professors from the university said.
University vice-chancellor M K Surappa said the university is only trying to adopt best practices from top institutions like IITs.
"We are not doing anything new in university. All top institutions like central universities and IITs have emeritus professors in good numbers. The university is only trying to adopt best practices from those institutions," said Surappa. He said the appointment of these professors is only on temporary basis and they are being paid honorarium, not full salary.
Central agencies like All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), University Grants Commission (UGC) and the department of science and technology (DST) have schemes to employ retired professors.
"We have less than 20 professors currently. There was a confusion over their appointment. So, we have adopted guidelines for their appointment. The maximum amount to be paid is 1.5 lakh, which is less than a professor's salary. But, all our existing emeritus professors are receiving much lower amount," he said.
Educationists said the move is common practice among higher educational institutions. "There is nothing wrong in appointing retired professors from eminent institutions like IITs and the university as professors of eminence. It is common practice in higher educational institutions across the world," says E Balagurusamy, former vice-chancellor of Anna University.
Retirement age for Anna University professors is 60 while in institutions like IITs and IISc it is 65.
"Some professors may still be at their peak in their research and academic activity while retiring. If they are physically and mentally fit, there is absolutely nothing wrong in using their expertise for research and teaching," he said while urging politicians to stay away from interfering into academic matters of an autonomous institution like the university.