Jharkhand: Communication gap hits BBMKU Dhanbad teachers’ body elections

SUBHASH MISHRA

Ranchi, Nov 23: A communication gap among the election committee members has disrupted the Teachers’ Association poll process in Binod Bihari Mahto Koylanchal University (BBMKU) Dhanbad and constituent colleges of Bokaro.

Both the general secretary of the outgoing Teachers Association, Dr Himanshu Shekhar Choudhary and Dr BN Singh, had appointed a seven-member election committee on September 21  but even after 63 days, not a single meeting of the election committee has been held so far.  The members have not even held telephonic talks among themselves over the poll so far.

The BBMKU poll has been due since 2021. After the creation of a separate university in 2017, the first election of the teachers’ body was held in 2018.

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The election committee officials are Dr SKL Das (chief election officer), Dr RS Yadav, Dr SK Sinha, Dr OP Sinha ( all deputy chief election officer), Dr Uma Mageshwari and Dr DN Singh both presiding officers).

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Dr KM Singh (PG English department) is the convener and Dr SK Sinha is the chief coordinator of the committee.

A senior assistant professor of the university today said that it was the duty of the convener (Dr KM Singh) to convene a meeting of the election committee but rather than discharging the responsibility he went away to his native village.

“In 2018, in the first election of the Teachers Association, only two members,  Dr SKL Das (the then dean of social science) and Dr RC Prasad (the then HoD of political science), smoothly conducted the poll on a very short notice.  Dr Himanshu Shekhar Choudhary was also the third active member in poll preparation but he opted out of the committee after he filed a nomination for the post of general secretary. In the second election, there are  7 members in the poll committee but no one looks serious and interested in conducting,” said the assistant professor.

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Chief election officer Dr SKL Das, when contacted, claimed that the election would be completed by the second week of December.  However, he admitted that due to the communication gap among poll committee members, not a single meeting has been held so far.

“Due to development in the university (the sacking of the Vice-Chancellor) and festivals, meetings could not be held. The university has opened today and we will hold a meeting in two to three days to fix the date of nomination, voting and other process.  Since candidates are to be given a minimum of 10 to 15 days for canvassing, the poll would be completed by the second week of December,” said Dr Das.

Sources said that the election committee has no funds to print ballot papers or nomination sheets of candidates.