HC grants interim stay on order

The Madras High Court today granted interim stay on the Tamil Nadu Directorate of Collegiate Education's order, reverting the post of a lady principal of a city college to that of a lecturer and to recover a sum of Rs 17,00,549 from her.
Passing an interim order on a petition filed by Nausheen Dawood, Principal of Justice Basheer Ahmed Sayeed College for Women in Chennai, Justice D Hariparanthaman said the impugned order of reduction in rank and the order seeking to recover the amount was without notice.
Nausheen Dawood, a PhD in Zoology, joined JBAS College for Women as a lecturer on June 12, 1996 and was later promoted as the principal on June 1, 2009.

She had started her career as a scientist in a research project of the then Ministry of Science and Technology (now Department of Science and Technology) in University of Madras till February 2, 1990.
She then worked as a scientist pool officer in CSIR, New Delhi till Oct 31, 1991, before she joined Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board as environmental scientist till June 11, 1996.
The Principal Accountant General had sent an audit report on June 13 last, raising objection that with only 13 years of service, she had been made a principal and that she did not have requisite experience of 15 years.

Based on PAG report, Directorate of Collegiate Education sent a notification, saying she lacked a service of three years, eight months and 11 days at the time of her promotion as college principal and reverted her to the post of a lecturer.

It also directed her college management to recover the excess payment of Rs 17,00,549 paid to her as salary.
The order was challenged stating that Directorate of Collegiate Education and PAG had no authority to assess and determine qualification of principals in affiliated colleges.
She submitted that the University of Madras was the competent authority to approve the qualification of teachers in colleges and had approved her appointment.

Contending that reversion orders were passed with non-application of mind and based on non-existent and incorrect facts and details, she claimed that she was fully qualified to hold the post of principal of her college and prayed to quash the order.