New Delhi, Aug. 13: The culture ministry’s effort to find a director for the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (NMML) has run into a controversy with public intellectual Pratap Bhanu Mehta resigning from the executive council to protest the “marginalisation” of academic credentials in the selection process.
Mehta sent his letter of resignation to the chairman of the executive council, Lokesh Chandra, on Thursday soon after he differed with the selection committee’s decision to recommend Shakti Sinha, an influential official from Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s PMO, to the post along with the chairperson of Ignou’s faculty of history, Kapil Kumar.
Kumar’s name was apparently included as an after-thought when Mehta registered his protest over Sinha’s selection and demanded re-advertisement of the post.
Apparently, all other members of the six-member selection committee — headed by junior external affairs minister M.J. Akbar — green-signalled Sinha’s name for recommendation to the appointments committee of the cabinet which has to clear any such appointment.
Sinha is on the board of directors of the think-tank, India Foundation, along with four members of the Union council of ministers, including Akbar, and senior BJP leader Ram Madhav.
Another member of the selection committee and Prasar Bharati chairman, A. Surya Prakash, is also on the board of the India Foundation.
Uncomfortable with the direction the NMML has chosen over the past couple of weeks when the post was advertised without the council’s approval, Mehta is of the view that the advertisement itself opened the window for a “pure administrator” to be considered for the position.
At the meeting, he flagged the fact that the advertisement — released on July 22 — was at variance with what had been cleared by the executive council.
Selecting Sinha for the post would send a signal that “completely marginalises issues of academic credibility, scholarly credentials or larger contribution to the world of ideas of thinking,” Mehta noted.
In his opinion, the NMML is more than just a memorial or a library; “it is central to the world of historical scholarship” and should be headed by someone who commands intellectual respect.
For a post lying vacant since previous director Mahesh Rangarajan quit in September last after Union minister of state for culture Mahesh Sharma raised questions about his appointment process, the ministry gave just a bit over a week for sending in applications.
The post was advertised on July 22 and the last date for receipt of applications was August 1.
While others in the know of what transpired in the selection committee pointed out that Mehta himself had agreed to the short list of five, including Sinha, from all the applicants for the interview stage, the political scientist who heads the Centre for Policy Research said in his letter that the “overall pool of applications” was not up to the mark.
This, he conceded, was partly because of the “tight deadline”. As a result of the limited timeframe, the executive council, too, did not have time to scout for candidates and sound them out.
