Madras High Court Stays Tamil Nadu Amendments On Vice Chancellor Appointments

Chennai: Days after the Tamil Nadu Government armed with the Supreme Court’s deemed assent granted to 10 Bills on which the Governor had delayed action, notified amendments stripping the Governor of powers to appoint Vice Chancellors to State universities, the Madras High Court on Wednesday stayed the operation of the same. 

The Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly had passed amendments vesting the State Government with the authority of appointing Vice Chancellors, replacing the Governor-Chancellor. However, passing interim orders on a petition filed an advocate Kutty alias Venkatachalapathy challenging the amendments, a Vacation Bench of Justices G R Swaminathan and V Lakshminarayan granted stay on their operation. 

The order was passed, although, earlier in the day, counsel representing the State informed the Bench that it had filed a petition before the Supreme Court urging to transfer to itself Kutty’s PIL petition pending before the High Court and hear them along with connected cases.

The counsel also urged the court to grant time for filing a counter affidavit contending there was no urgency to take up the stay petition during the vacation sitting.  However, the judges declined the request.