Anyone believes it or not!

Whether anyone believes it or not, corruption has happened. Appointments of teachers on hourly basis were made recently in ‘Shakam’ (Govt Art College) of Aurangabad. These appointments, of course, turned out to be controversial as the local candidates of Aurangabad are alleging that the candidates who completed their education last year were selected while excluding the experienced candidates. We are publishing this special article as we have found their complaints to be genuine.

After JJ’s issues getting sorted out, now a large number of calls have started coming from Aurangabad as well. These phone calls of course are from the students, alumni or in rare cases former teachers of the government art college there. Everyone says the same thing, why don’t you do the same with our case as you did to JJ? Some even say, ‘Why do we get this biassed treatment as we are from Marathwada?’ I generally ignore that kind of language. The issues of caste, creed and province are secondary in my view. But often these people come with such a prejudiced or political stance that even talking to them becomes difficult. They never quit the slogan of ‘Injustice to Marathwada’. So I immediately stop communicating with such people and also delete their number from the phone.

In fact we have published several news articles about Government College Aurangabad so far. Of course, this may be due to the poor information sourcing in our communication system. But we have removed that error now. Now it is certain that the next target will be ‘Shakam’ (Govt Art College) Aurangabad.

There has been a major rise in the number of complaints against the officials there. One of our friends was even saying (he is from the close friend circle of the Education Minister) that so many terrible complaints have been received against the officials and the Dean there that he was wondering how these people were selected for appointment on those posts in the first place. If so, then it seems to be a good sign. Anyway.

Recently about three to four dozen teachers were temporarily appointed in ‘Shakam’ (Govt Art College) Aurangabad on hourly basis teaching. We are getting very bad feedback about it. Just to give an example, the GR in this regard was published on 23rd March 2023. But it took the dawn of 20th June 2023 to take action in this regard. This gives an idea of how concerned the Dean or the similar  authorities are about the education of the students.

A large number of applications were received for these hourly basis teaching posts. A selection committee of four teachers was formed for that. One of them was Ramesh Vadje, the Dean of ‘Shakam’ (Govt Art College). He is said to be a sculptor. Second was Vijay Suralkar who was appointed for applied arts. Shiny Dethe was third. Her subject is textile. The fourth was Vinod Dandge. He has got nothing to do with painting. He was probably there for making the documents. In fact he was very sick. He works in both Mumbai and Aurangabad. A few months ago, while in Mumbai, one day he suddenly fainted, and fell very ill. But only Vadje knows why his name was given. Because Shri Vinod Dandge was absent during the entire interview process.

Besides, Ganesh Tartare, a Professor at JJ School of Art, came from Mumbai as an ‘External Subject Matter Expert’ to conduct the interviews. He teaches in the Department of Art and Training at JJ in Mumbai. It is seen that in this entire committee, not a single teacher was appointed to interview the teachers from the Painting and Drawing department. Precisely from this fact the entire episode of these interviews starts to look suspicious.

They did not need one more interviewer for painting and drawing department because candidates who attended the interview directly alleged that three-four candidates selected for the painting and drawing department were actually pre-selected and sent from Mumbai itself. In this regard, when an inquiry was made at JJ School of Art in Mumbai, the concerned persons in Mumbai confirmed it. One of the candidates said on the day before going to the interview in the premises of JJ that, “Now I am going to Aurangabad, I will not return to Mumbai any time soon. I have been selected among the teachers who are going to be appointed at Aurangabad on an hourly teaching basis by ‘Saheb’ (Boss). (Who is Saheb? Regular readers of ‘Chinha’ would have known by now) Not only me, but  two or three others have been selected by Saheb. I am going there only to complete the formalities.” He said confidently. He even seems to have thrown a party for his close friends to celebrate his appointment.

These two-three candidates who had gone from Mumbai seem to be doing the jobs for ‘Saheb’ in Mumbai. Please don’t think that they do some dishwashing or household cleaning job, what else one could do for the government official in the field of art? But because of his government position in the art field, whatever commercial works worth not millions but crores of rupees come to his art college, are taken up by ‘Saheb’ and then distributed to the people of his clan. ‘Saheb’ takes such needy students as his helping hands to complete the small tasks. So that there is no need to pay the charges that professional artists would have to be paid. Students are also very needy. They always face money crunch in a city like Mumbai. How much money could they ask for from home? Therefore, they get easily trapped in the trap of the ‘Saheb’. And get into the business. Elegance in art is forgotten. After exploiting them over four years of education in this way, Saheb makes them join any job that he can possibly find.

Unselected candidates in Aurangabad allege with names and other details that he (Saheb) appointed some such students in Aurangabad college. One candidate even said that those who were selected had no teaching experience. Even the students who have passed just in the last year exam are selected here. And local candidates / teachers from Marathwada who have teaching experience and have actually taught in Shakam (Govt Art College) itself have been dropped. Is that justice? If this has happened, then it is a very serious matter. The Department of Higher and Technical Education should take immediate cognizance and investigate this whole matter.

Also, the manner in which the members of the selection committee were selected should also be investigated. ‘How did Mr Ganesh Tartare get appointed on this selection committee? Who appointed him?’ Actually he teaches in the teachers’ training department. ‘How come he was appointed here as an external subject matter expert?’ It is also a very serious matter if he was selected as an external subject matter expert in sculpture, fine art, or textiles. Tartare had pushed in two of his candidates also in the selection along with the ‘Saheb’ of Mumbai. That’s why, many candidates also alleged that the morale of the  local, experienced candidates was shot down by asking them twisted questions in the interview which they could not answer. If this is true, this is also a very serious matter. Even a week would not be enough if we decide to publish all the reactions we have received regarding this interview process. We shall publish those also, if necessary. Before that, is the Secretary of Higher and Technical Education Department going to take cognizance of this matter? Or going to ignore the whole matter as always? This is our blunt question for the Education Secretary!

While writing this article, it is learned that the in-charge art director Rajeev Mishra is in Aurangabad. Perhaps Rajiv Mishra might have been sent there for enquiry, probably due to the large number of complaints received by the Minister in this regard. However, it is also a well known fact that Rajiv Mishra has not taken any action in many such cases in the past. So we strongly believe that he will not do anything in this case either. That is why the candidates and their families are demanding that the government conduct a special enquiry into  this case.

Satish Naik

Editor, Chinha Art News