Row over erroneous KU degree certificates

Save University Campaign Committee says the varsity is yet to cancel them

The controversy over the moderated marks that were illegally awarded to several students allegedly by Kerala University officials two years ago resurfaced on Monday after the Save University Campaign Committee accused the university of attempting to cover up the folly rather than adopting remedial measures.

In a statement, organisation chairman R.S. Sasikumar and secretary M. Shajarkhan alleged the university was yet to cancel the degree certificates awarded to 23 students of career-related undergraduate courses who had benefited through the unauthorised modification of the moderated marks. The university authorities had found a total of 390 students to have been given additional marks.

Refuting allegations of any wilful malpractice, the university had also attributed the ‘error’ to a missing code in the moderation module of the tabulation software. The Director of its Computer Centre was also suspended for lapses in rectifying the glaring security flaws in the software despite being alerted on multiple occasions.

Save University Campaign Committee has now claimed that the University Senate was set to hold a special meeting on August 26 to include new provisions to the Statutes in order to cancel degree certificates that have been issued erroneously. The amendments will come into effect only after the Governor approved them.

They alleged that such attempts were being made even while the university was well within its rights currently to withdraw degrees under certain circumstances. While the proposed amendments will not have retrospective effect, the university is working to wilfully deny itself the opportunity to withdraw the degrees that had been unlawfully issued over two years ago, the complainants claimed.

They also accused the university of failing to hand over the documents pertaining to the moderation issue to the police, despite having then claimed to have sought a Crime Branch probe.

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