A day after the Delhi University called Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s degree “authentic”, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday said that their suspicion about the degree being forged has “deepened further” after an hour-long meeting with varsity’s Vice-Chancellor Yogesh Tyagi.
The AAP claimed that DU V-C said that “he is under pressure from the Centre.” However, while talking to The Pioneer, the DU V-C refused of having said anything like that. The AAP had demanded to inspect the PM’s documents and sought the permission to see the degree certificate for scrutiny, which they were denied by the V-C.
“Our suspicion that the PM’s degree is fake and forged has only become deeper after meeting the DU V-C... He refused to allow any inspection or producing any document before us. It was very evident from his demeanor that he is under pressure from the Centre. In fact he said so,” AAP leader Sanjay Singh said to the media outside the Vice Regal lodge of DU’s North campus.
“The V-C shared that he was under pressure. He requested us to understand that there are pulls and pressures from higher authorities,” Sanjay claimed.
The V-C has asked the AAP leaders to check and clarify their doubts with the CPIO “as the matter lies with them.” On Tuesday, DU Registrar, Tarun Das had clarified with media that the PM’s degree is “authentic” but the AAP knocked on the doors of the vice chancellor to get a glimpse of the original documents and scrutinise them.
Irked with the refusal from the V-C, Singh accused the university officials of a “cover up”.
“He told us to go meet CPIO, when we have already done that! We were also surprised to know that V-C did not own any claim made by the Registrar which clearly proved that the registrar’s version is dicy,” he added. “When we told him if RTI cell is the only authority to speak on the issue, why did the registrar say the degree was authentic. To our surprise, he replied since the registrar is not present among us, we must not discuss anything related to him.” AAP leaders Ashutosh, Dilip Pandey and Ashish Khetan met the V-C along with Singh.
Earlier in the day, AAP raised fresh doubts over the discrepancies and posed several questions to the DU registrar for authenticating the “fake marks sheet”.
Ashutosh said why is it that the mark sheets of other students released during the same time, name and subjects of the applicants are handwritten, but in the mark sheet of Modi released by the BJP, name and subjects of the applicant are not handwritten. “In mark sheets available with us the marks obtained by the students are handwritten, whereas in the mark sheet of Modi, the marks are not handwritten. WhyIJ In mark sheets available with us the word ‘Passed’ is handwritten. Why the word ‘passed’ is not handwritten in Modi’s marksheetIJ” Ashutosh asked.
He said the mark sheets available with them also have signatures of the competent authorities under the two particular heads while in Modi’s marks sheet one heading is missing, they asked.
“Modi’s mark sheet appears to be computer generated. Did the Delhi University have computers in 1975IJ Modern fonts have been used in Modi’s mark sheet. Were these fonts available in 1975IJ” Ashutosh added.
The party parried questions on what would be their next plan of action. “We are not naive players in the game. First let us get the varsity comply with the Chief Information Commissioner’s (CIC) order, but we will take the case to a logical conclusion,” AAP leader Sanjay Singh said.