The Madras High Court on Wednesday restrained the University of Madras from going ahead with the conduct of elections to its syndicate on Saturday without allowing an academic council member, who had filed a writ petition alleging rejection of her nomination on flimsy grounds, to contest.
Justice R. Subramanian granted the interim injunction on a writ petition filed by M. Uma, principal of Prince Shri Venkateshwara Arts and Science College at Gowrivakkam. The judge also ordered notice, returnable by four weeks, to the university and said the injunction would operate until further orders.
He agreed with the petitioner’s counsel Krishna Srinivasan that the litigant had made out a prima facie case of exceptional circumstance for grant of interim injunction though the court would normally not stall any election process. He said the rejection of petitioner’s nomination appeared to be unjust.
Mr. Srinivasan brought it to the notice of the court that his client was also the university’s academic council member and therefore fully eligible to contest for the post of syndicate member under that relevant category. However, the university insisted on production of salary slips, income tax returns and so on.
The petitioner sought time to produce those documents since her chartered accountant was not available in town. Without waiting for it, the university published the valid nominations on September 13 and excluded the petitioner’s name from the list forcing her to move the present writ petition.
