New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU)’s new Vice-Chancellor Santishree Dhulipudi Pandit is currently undergoing harsh scrutiny by academic and political elite alike. After a row over her alleged past tweets, she has now courted a fresh controversy over her English language skills.
In a press statement Monday after she was named the V-C, Santishree thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and laid out the agenda before her as the institute’s chief. But her statement has attracted criticism over several grammatical errors in it, including expressions like “students friendly” and missing articles.
On Tuesday, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Varun Gandhi said the V-C’s statement was an “exhibition of illiteracy”. He said such “mediocre appointments serve to damage our human capital”.
“This press release from the new JNU VC is an exhibition of illiteracy, littered with grammatical mistakes (would strive vs will strive;students friendly vs student-friendly;excellences vs excellence).Such mediocre appointments serve to damage our human capital & our youth’s future,” he said.
This press release from the new JNU VC is an exhibition of illiteracy,littered with grammatical mistakes (would strive vs will strive;students friendly vs student-friendly;excellences vs excellence).Such mediocre appointments serve to damage our human capital & our youth’s future pic.twitter.com/tSanmy3VfR
— Varun Gandhi (@varungandhi80) February 8, 2022
Speaking to ThePrint about his tweets, Gandhi said: “With few higher education institutions at par with global standards, India needs to have the right leaders to shape the journey for universities likely to succeed. As such, appointing someone with little to offer in academic vision, credentials or even the ability to communicate, is a path to mediocrity and long-term illiteracy for our human capital.
“We need leaders, with the right values, and discipline — not those who cannot do basic due diligence on their first press release with regards to their appointment. A great institution like JNU needs empathy, sensitivity and careful steering, not a loudmouth, with little verbal control. Academic credentials and past experience, not retweets, should be the criteria for selection.”
Other prominent academics and personalities joined in too and criticised her statement over the poor language skills.
Wonder how many nations appoint people who have trouble stringing together two grammatical sentences to head one of their leading universities. And in how many of those nations does a section of the population applaud the choice? #JNU https://t.co/9IGlrgnbDr
— Sadanand Dhume (@dhume) February 7, 2022
Message from JNU’s new VC:
“Indo-centric narratives,” “clean administration,” “academic excellences,” “students friendly”
The butchering of the English language that unites all right-wingers.
Weep my friends, weep. pic.twitter.com/WVPAC9aTia
— Ayesha Ray (@DrAyeshaRay) February 7, 2022
The best way to kill an institution is to hire a mediocre, sycophantic adminstrator. This press release from the new JNU VC tells us all we need to know about the quality of this appointment. If you can’t build institutions, at least don’t destroy those built by others. pic.twitter.com/fPr9CTpWZ5
— Nikhil Alva (@njalva) February 8, 2022
ThePrint reached a JNU spokesperson and Pandit for a comment on this row via texts, but there was no response until the time of publishing this report.
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Didn’t thank President, say critics
In her statement, the first female V-C of the central university, said that her administration would provide a “students friendly and gender sensitive” environment for academic research. She also said that the focus would be on constructing “Indo-centric narratives”.
Moreover, while she mentioned the PM, some Twitter users highlighted that the statement didn’t express gratitude to the President, who is the final authority for such appointments.
The new JNU VC forgets to thank the appointing authority, the President of India. Heh. pic.twitter.com/N2tv6DRGIU
— Abhishek Baxi (@baxiabhishek) February 7, 2022
Tweets also in question
The language skills row is only the latest controversy to surround this appointment.
On Monday, just hours after she was named V-C, Pandit’s Twitter account, which was filled with ‘hateful’ tweets, came under scrutiny and was later deleted. However, it could not be confirmed if it was her profile.
Many Twitter users shared old tweets made from the handle “@SantishreeD” in support of the ruling BJP and its IT cell head, Amit Malviya.
Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair shared screenshots of old tweets — posted from her alleged account in 2015 — that referred to Sunni Islam as “radical”.
Newly appointed Vice Chancellor of JNU. pic.twitter.com/tkxv9wAG4Z
— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) February 7, 2022
Is this person an educationist or a two rupee troll?
Or does the government believe that there is no difference between the two? https://t.co/Imo92hJTPB— vir sanghvi (@virsanghvi) February 7, 2022
The appointment of Pandit, a professor at Savitribai Phule Pune University, was confirmed after acting JNU V-C M. Jagadesh Kumar was made chairperson of the University Grants Commission last week. Kumar’s tenure had ended last year.
According to her bio on the Pune University website, she knows Telugu, Tamil, Marathi, Hindi, Sanskrit and English, and can understand Kannada, Malayalam and Konkani.
She is a political scientist and JNU alumnus herself. According to her bio, after completing her graduation and postgraduation from Presidency College in Chennai, Pandit pursued her MPhil and PhD in international relations from JNU. Her PhD thesis subject was ‘Parliament and foreign policy in India – The Nehru years’.
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