Nagpur: Even as controversy over the state higher and technical education department deducting Rs 23 lakh from the funds meant for salaries of Nagpur University’s 800+ employees continues, joint director of higher education Archana Nerkar clarified that the money was deposited with her office and not yet transferred to the government.
The amount was deducted from salaries of NU employees in lieu of recovery of Rs 23 lakh from ex-registrar Puran Meshram, who retired on June 30. The department had found that Meshram was granted Rs 23 lakh extra salary for all these years, despite the fact he opted for non-teaching cadre.
The former registrar, who superannuated on June 30, was fighting a legal battle in Nagpur bench of Bombay high court for service extension that would subsequently ensure him higher pay-scale of a teacher.
Breaking her silence on the controversy, Nerkar said that the move to deduct salary was taken as per directives from the Supreme Court and also to stop NU from granting any clearance to Meshram regarding his dues till further orders from the HC or government.
“We’re awaiting HC’s verdict. Once that is delivered, we would return the entire amount to NU. We can’t take direct action against him (Meshram) since the matter is sub-judice,” she told TOI.
Surprisingly, her move to deduct funds from NU wasn’t being protested till date by any of its top officials, though they made tall claims orally. In fact, NU had taken the loss on its own by paying salaries of employees from its general funds, otherwise it would have caused a big uproar in the academic circles.
Vice-chancellor SP Kane told TOI that they would be soon writing a letter to the government on Nerkar’s decision to punish NU employees for no fault.
“The government could have recovered it from the person concerned. What’s the point in punishing innocent employees? It was yet to award the retirement and pensionary benefits to Meshram and could have withhold those dues,” he said. Nerkar, in her letter to NU, mentioned that the government had paid extra amount of Rs 22,84,273 to Meshram since 2009, which was slashed from June’s salary.
Usually, NU pays salaries of its big workforce of over 800 employees by first day of every month from its general funds and later adjusts the dues released by the government. This time, however, Rs 23 lakh was not deposited out of Rs 4 crore, thus leading to deficit in its general funds.
NU officials said that the university wil be raising the issue during its next Management Council meeting. In March, HC restrained NU from releasing Meshram’s retirement benefits without its orders after an intervention by former chairman of mass communication board Sunil Mishra.
In his application, Mishra claimed that Meshram’s entire service was “bogus” and total recovery was Rs 65 lakh instead of Rs 23 lakh.
