Bengal Assembly Passes Bill To Replace Governor With CM Mamata Banerjee As Chancellor Of State-Run Universities

The West Bengal Assembly on Monday passed a bill to make Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee the Chancellor of all state universities, a position traditionally held by the state Governor. 

The West Bengal University Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2022 was passed by 182 votes in favor against 40 not in favor in the 294-member Assembly. However, the Bill is yet to receive the assent of Governor Jagdeep Dhankar. 

The BJP has however opposed the bill and alleged that that appointing the chief minister as chancellor would lead to direct "political interference" in the state's higher education system.

On May 26, the State cabinet had passed a resolution to remove Dhankar, and make Mamata the chancellor in his place. The State cabinet had earlier also approved a proposal to remove the Governor as a Visitor at private universities with the State Education minister replacing him.

The state-run universities in West Bengal come under various government departments such as health, agriculture, animal husbandry and minority affairs.

The move comes in the backdrop of Governor Jadgeep Dhankhar's clash with the state government over appointments of vice-chancellors across universities. According to reports, Dhankar had earlier alleged that the state government had appointed several Vice-Chancellors without his consent.

In a related development, last month Tamil Nadu had passed a bill empowering the state government to take over the Governor's power of appointing vice-chancellors to universities. The Tamil Nadu Universities Laws (Amendment) Act, 2022, and Chennai University Act, 1923 (Chennai University (Amendment) Act, 2022) were passed with the expression "chancellor" being replaced with "government" on 25 April, 2022. This move was also seen as a political struggle between governor and MK Stalin-led DMK government in Tamil Nadu.