IIM-Rohtak Board decides to send director on leave until probe is over

The inquiry order was issued on March 5, and IIM-Mumbai Director Professor Manoj Tiwari has been asked to submit his report within three months.

With Sharma under scrutiny for allegedly misrepresenting his educational qualifications to secure his initial term as IIM-Rohtak Director in 2017, the institute’s failure to send Sharma’s degree certificate to the Ministry of Education despite “repeated” requests will also be probed.

According to the minutes of the BoG meeting held on March 20, the Board took up the matter of the Visitorial inquiry against Sharma after receiving two letters from the Ministry of Education on March 13 and March 19. The Board then decided to send him on leave “till the completion of the inquiry” and to also ask him to stay away from all campuses/ rented areas of IIM-Rohtak until further orders. The minutes also state that Sharma would be given “reasonable time” to move out.

The proceedings of the last BoG meeting were submitted by Additional Solicitor General of India Satypal Jain in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which is currently hearing a case challenging Sharma’s appointment as the IIM-Rohtak director.

It is learnt that the BoG resolution will only be implemented after the Court’s go-ahead, since the matter is sub-judice.

The Visitorial inquiry against Sharma is the first such action since amendments to the IIM Act in 2023 gave the education ministry greater control over the IIMs.

According to the ministry, the inquiry has been launched based on an earlier probe by its principal chief controller of accounts, which had found “serious irregularities and grave misappropriation of public funds at IIM-Rohtak”.

The alleged irregularities, according to the order, included: “Wrongfully inflating the financial health of the institute and using such manipulated figures to pay huge amount of variable pay (more than Rs 1 crore for each year) to the Director of IIM-Rohtak, for the years from 2018-19 onwards; violating General Financial Rules 2017 in managing the finances of the institute; and procuring and gifting mobile phones and other inducements to unnamed persons.”

The institute has maintained that the variable pay to Sharma was given as per the IIM Act and paid only after IIM-Rohtak’s Regulations under the IIM Act and Rules were notified.

The ministry’s order said it had “repeatedly sought” Sharma’s degree certificate during his first term as Director, but this was not sent by IIM-Rohtak “till the fag end of his tenure”. Sharma first served as IIM-Rohtak Director from 2017 to 2022. In 2022, he was reappointed for a second term, which is to end in 2027.

According to the order, the inquiry will look into the “omission/ commission of acts” with respect to the “irregularities” mentioned and will also cover the method of storing and verifying the degree certificates of the Director and other faculty at IIM-Rohtak, as well as the procedure followed in “sending/ withholding replies” including queries raised by the Ministry of Education.

The inquiry comes almost three years after the ministry told the Punjab and Haryana High Court in 2022 that Sharma had allegedly “misrepresented” his credentials, leading to his illegal appointment. According to the ministry, a first-class Bachelor’s degree was necessary for appointment as Director, but Sharma only had a second division at the undergraduate level.

The ministry had then issued a showcause notice to Sharma asking why it shouldn’t initiate action against him for “concealing” his Bachelor’s degree and bringing disrepute to the institute. Sharma had challenged this notice in court on the grounds that the Centre lacked jurisdiction in the matter since the IIM’s Board of Governors is the appointing authority.

In 2023, the Centre amended the IIM Act, 2017, to make the President the Visitor of the IIMs. With the amendment, the President was given the authority to make key appointments, audit institutions and conduct inquiries — powers that were previously held by the Board of Governors.

The government now acts through the Visitor, the President, in matters concerning IIMs.