One of the Congress general secretaries had ‘prompted’ the Union HRD Ministry about the issue of ‘conflict of interest’ of UGC member Yogendra Yadav and his political association with Arvind Kejriwal’s party AAP almost four months ago. The Ministry on Wednesday sought an explanation from Yadav within a week.
Sources said that the party general secretary had written to the HRD Minister MM Pallam Raju in May 2013 about Yadav. “It was following this that we initiated our process,” confided a source.
The matter could not be taken then as Raju had been on long-duration foreign trips. Of late, Yadav who is also a political scientist has been vocal about several policies of HRD Ministry and has also opposed coming up of an inter-university centre (IUC) on teacher training institution in Kakinada.
Reacting to the controversy, Yadav told The Pioneer he had already informed the Minister as well as UGC about his political inclination long ago. He was made a member of the UGC during Kapil Sibal’s tenure. Yadav had also hit headlines when he resigned as one of the chief advisors for NCERT over the issue of dropping the BR Ambedkar cartoon from a textbook.
The Higher Education Department of HRD Ministry in its letter said continuance of Yadav in the UGC is a conflict of interest since as an AAP member he is guided by his party’s ideology, agenda and manifesto. Sources said if Yadav does not reply within a week, the Ministry would remove him on the basis of available records. However, Yadav confirmed that he would respond to the show cause notice soon.
Noting that Yadav’s “antecedents and credentials at the time of his appointment in 2011, and now stands substantially altered”, the ministry in its notice asked him to provide an explanation within seven days before initiating further action. The notice said Yadav has not only “joined a registered political party as an office-bearer but also participated in political forums organised by the aforesaid party”.
Slamming the ministry and the UGC for their policies, Yadav said there seems to be some politics but doesn’t know who is playing it. Yadav said that the UGC Act does not bar members from being a member of any political party nor does Commission’s code on conflict of interest mention it.