IIT-Madras told to follow department-wise reservation in MS, PhD admissions – Times of India

CHENNAI: The National Commission for Scheduled Castes on Monday directed IIT-Madras to follow department-wise reservation in MS, PhD admissions from next academic year.
Commission’s vice-chairman Arun Haldar, who reviewed implementation of the reservation policy at the institute on Monday, directed it to strictly follow the quota rules in all future recruitment of faculty. The commission also asked the institute to submit an action taken report within two to three months.
“The vice-chairman directed the IIT-Madras to specify department-wise and caste-wise reservation in MS and PhD programmes while inviting applications from next academic year on wards,” said G Sunil Kumar Babu, director of National Commission for Scheduled Castes in Hyderabad, who was also part of the team that visited IIT-Madras.
The commission also raised the low representation for SCs among faculty. “The institute said that no SC candidates were available and promised there will be at least three to four SC candidates in the upcoming recruitment,” he said.
Recently, a faculty member at IIT-Madras alleged caste discrimination as primary reason for quitting the institute. His email to all faculty members stirred a nationwide debate about casteism in IITs. Some reports claimed that the faculty member belonged to the SC community.
To a query whether the commission inquired about the discrimination faced by the faculty member, Sunil Kumar Babu said, “We want to clarify that the faculty member who resigned recently from IIT-Madras belongs to OBC, not SC.”
The commission conducted a review at IIT-Madras following the representation from IIT Madras SC/ST Employees Welfare Association, which complained about the poor representation of SCs, STs in faculty. “We mentioned the violation of reservation policy by the institute and demanded a special recruitment drive to fill up the backlog,” said R Elango Santhuram, secretary of the association.
According to the institute’s reply to an RTI query from IIT alumnus E Muralitharan, only 12.4% of the faculty members are from reserved categories. At the assistant professors level, only 2% are from SC category against 15% reservation and 0.7% are from STs against 7.5% reservation followed in centrally funded institutions.