A senior official from the Anna University, seeking anonymity, said that despite the deadline to submit the credentials being extended twice, the faculties were yet to submit the same. “Initially, the last date was fixed as March 18 and thereafter extended till April 30,” he added. 

Stating that there were more than 9,000 faculties members, who were working in various affiliated colleges, have Ph.D. degrees, the official said “already about 6,500 certificates have been verified before COVID-19 pandemic situation.” 

Explaining about the doubts that emerged over the genuineness of certificates, he said while appointment, many faculties had produced certificates from different institutions and lending their names to many colleges, which allegedly lead to suspicion. 

“In addition, it was also noticed that the Aadhaar number, which was given by the candidates, were found to be fake,” he said adding “even few faculties have submitted wrong PAN number.” 

Expressing difficulty in submitting the genuineness of the Ph.D. certificate, a senior principal of a city college pointed out that the students have already approached their respective universities where they got the Ph.D. certificate to authorise it. 

“However, due to COVID-19, there was a big communication gap between the university and the students,” he said adding “some students were not in a position to travel to the university to get the authorisation due to pandemic situation.” 

He said that his management of the college has already approached AICTE to instruct Anna University to give more time for the student to prove the credentials of their Ph.D. Echoing similar views, another vice-principal of an engineering college, affiliated with Anna University, requested it not only to give additional time for the students, but also it could directly approach AICTE for solving this issue.