6. 1. Powers and functions
According to participants, a VC wears multiple hats during his service.
As part of the Chancellor’s Office (CO), he provides executive
leadership in assisting the CO in planning, developing, organizing,
directing and controlling academic programs, policies, procedures and
guidelines. He supervises deans and directors in evaluating and
approving their recommendations for faculty hiring, promotion and
tenure. A VC oversees budget preparation for the academic programs,
allocates funds and manages resources to achieve academic goals and
objectives. He provides leadership in creating and maintaining academic
standards and policies. He serves as Chief Advisor to the Chancellor
(President or Governor). A VC has a team of appropriate professional
administrators, directors, deans, chair persons and heads of departments
(HDs) for his assistance. A successful VC, as one respondent R3 said,
“Vice-Chancellor maintains substantial contact with administrators like
directors and deans through Board of Governors, syndicates and Academic
Council meetings. The Vice-Chancellor can convene meetings of
committees, bodies and authorities whenever he considers necessary. He
can speak at any forum but has no right to vote”. Hence, it is VC’s
duty to ensure that government directives, provisions of act, statutes,
ordinance and regulations are being observed in decisions of
authorities, bodies and committees. He supervises the recommendations of
Selection Board on the observance of merit in recruitments and
promotions. He can undo decisions of authorities, bodies and committees
inconsistent with the act, statutes or regulations. The VC can take any
decision during the emergency but is bound to communicate its
justification to the Chancellor or University Management Council (MC).
The VC is the appointing and disciplinary authority for teachers, yet if
his decision affects any teacher, then a notice with reasonable time
must be given to the victim to appeal to the MC. The VC has right to
initiate inspection of any person, body, building, laboratory, library,
workshop and equipment at university or affiliated college if the matter
relates to finance of university. In the case of nonprofit organizations
the VC or Rector performs his functions by the general policy guidelines
laid down by Board of Governors (BGs). These guidelines must be
accessible to the general public through the Internet. Non-government
organizations running universities in developing countries often hide
these guidelines and modify the sentences according to their needs in
court cases. Members of BGs are appointed on the racial basis to
maintain their absolute majority. This ethnic majority only recommends
like-minded fellows to sustain their absolute monopoly. This language,
race and religion based cartelism is also visible in public sector
universities and the government institutes (Tan, Sharma 2013).
Some participants like R2 and R5 compared the roles and perceptions
about these roles in East and West. R2 added, “Here VC and his role
means powers and duties, whereas they (European universities) focus on
the role and responsibilities”. Of course, both phrases “powers and
duties” and “role and responsibilities” mean the same but leave
impressions of “Imperialism and Slavery” on reader’s mind. Our words
reveal whatever we hide in hearts. Words “powers” and “duties” are
extreme words reflecting inherited slavery. India-Pakistan executives
struggle hard for executive posts and then exercise every sub-clause to
avail the opportunity. A VC’s position means different to different
incumbents in East and West. Asians VCs look to Western universities for
collaborations to upgrade their ranks, but they look to Asian
universities to monitor their state of the art and earn money. Western
universities have started dual and joint degree programs with Asian
universities to make money using their internationally recognized names.
The Chancellor is a political figurehead in commonwealth countries but a
chief executive in other nations. Universities having a large number of
affiliated colleges may employ VCs for them. The Chancellor and VC’s
jobs mean different things to different incumbents. As R4 said,
“everybody understands the role and responsibilities of Vice
Chancellors but the part they play does reflect their mindsets. It is
quite dangerous to be purely a chief executive as at heart it is all
about teaching and research”.
Universities have grown regarding their economy, yet they are a long way
from being an academic cottage industry. Universities are cash rich
institutes, but their major focus is to prepare skilled human resources
to bring social change. Community respects institutes of higher
learning, but if one sees the deep dark march of follies, then he/she
will quickly realize that people of similar sects and races are visible
on all key posts. Shamshad Ahmad, Foreign Ex-Secretary, in his article
on Renaissance of Pakistan has explicitly pointed out undercurrents
against ethnic and racial priorities which are more visible in
universities. To ride through merit barrier, the bureaucracy fixes 60
marks for real unchallengeable credentials and 40 scores for interviews
which are often the cause of ethnic decisions. If it becomes unavoidable
to employ any out of cloud expert due to professional reasons then
his/her salary is fixed at the abject minimum with the verbal promise to
increase later due to one or other reasons. They use performance-based
criterion to justify his/her low salary giving abundant emoluments to
their incompetent people.