Principal offender — Look who’s teaching at Burhani & Yashodhan

Shetye refused to comment when Newsline contacted him saying only the management (of his college) could comment. The honorary joint secretary and treasurer of Burhani Education society, Yusuff Uchwaniwalla, agreed to speak to Newsline on May 15 but backtracked, pegging co-ordinator Taher Mama as the right person for comment. After promising an appointment on May 17, Mama thought he needed more time to think about the matter. A letter was sent to him by Mumbai Newsline on May 19 enquiring abaout the acting-principal’s involvement, but no response was forthcoming.

President of the Forum for Fairness in Education (FFE), Bhagavanji Raiyani, who has filed the on-going case against coaching classes in the Bombay High Court on receiving an anonymous letter in this regard, ascertained the fact from the former principal of Burhani, Q A Saeed, about the issue. “After ascertaining Shetye’s involvement in the coaching class, I spoke to treasurer Yusuff Uchwaniwala late last month when Shetye had not yet been promoted to the post of acting principal. He assured me that he was ignorant of this matter and pending inquiry, he would not be promoted to the post,” said Raiyani. Shetye was inducted as acting principal a few days later. Raiyani now wants to bring this to the notice of the court at the next hearing of his case on June 19.

Raiyani also received a letter, dated April 19, from Saeed, stating that he had forwarded the FFE’s letter of inquiry to the Burhani college management.

The six committees formed by the state to ferret out and haul up teachers and principals linked to coaching classes across the state are far from satisfactory. “The committees work at a frustratingly slow pace,” reveals A E Lakdawala, principal of the Royal College of Arts, Science and Commerce, Mira Road. Thus, college authorities are yet to take action against teacher George Verghese whose salary was stopped in October 1998 on charges of not filing his undertaking correctly. Verghese was told last month to comply with the affidavit requirements lest the governing body decide the matter ex-parte.