Status quo on JIPMER head selection

Justice T Raja before whom the plea came posted the case for further hearing to after a week. 

Petitioner R Raveendran, professor and head, Pharmacology Department, JIPMER, along with five others had contended that since the term of the incumbent director ends on March 23, the second respondent Dr DK Patro, deputy director (administration) had called for applications for the post through a notification dated November 18, 2017, prescribing qualifications for the post. The last date of making applications was January 3, 2018. 

However, the present director, in a bid to ensure that one Dr VS Negi was selected as the director, imposed a condition that the candidates applying for the post of director must send in only articles/publications indexed in American indexing service called PudMed, the petitioner said, and noted that the condition was illegal when the initial notification calling for application failed to impose any restriction on the indexing service. 

Pointing out that the said condition was imposed only because Dr Negi, whom the present director and deputy director want to appoint, has a lot of publication in PubMed, while the other petitioners have publications only in other indices, the plea said.