Revaluation scam convict removed from varsity body

Nagpur, Jan 17 (UNI) Sunil Mishra, convicted recently by a special court here in a revaluation scandal dating back to 1995, was today removed from the post of chairman of the Ad Hoc Board for Mass Communication of Rashtrasant Tukdoji Maharaj (RTM) Nagpur University.

Official sources said Vice Chancellor Dr S N Pathan signed the orders removing Mishra from the membership of the board late this evening. Therefore, he also stood removed as chairman of the body, the sources said.

The orders were issued as per a provision in the law that no person convicted of moral turpitude could be a member of any body of the university, the sources said.

Dr Pathan has appointed Dr R P Saxena, former head of the university's department of Hindi, as the Chairman of the Ad Hoc Board in place of Mishra. Dr Saxena has held additional charge as head of the university's department of mass communication for a while.

Mishra is the director of the city-based Central India Institute of Mass Communication (CIIMC), which runs the Bachelor of Mass Communication (BMC) course of RTM Nagpur University besides bachelor's and master's courses in journalism of the Bhopal-based Makhanlal Chaturvedi National University of Journalism.

Mishra was convicted on January 10 vide sections 420, 468, 471 and 120 (B) of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced to 12 years and 6 months of rigorous imprisonment (RI) and a fine of Rs 42,000 for getting the revaluation records tampered for improving his score in a subject of LLB Part I examination of 1995, in which he had failed.

Mishra has been absconding since and the court has issued an arrest warrant against him.

UNI