Who Killed the Law of NSU and MU?

Universities are not private establishments run according to the wishes of individuals in power. They are statutory institutions created through Acts passed by Parliament or State Legislatures. Those Acts are the supreme governing frameworks of the universities. Any appointment, administrative order or exercise of authority outside the provisions of those Acts is not merely questionable — it is a direct assault on the rule of law governing higher education.
The growing controversy surrounding the appointment of Vice-Chancellors and Vice-Chancellor in-charge arrangements in institutions such as the National Sports University (NSU) and Manipur University (MU) raises disturbing questions. More alarming than the controversy itself is the silence surrounding it.
Who killed the law of NSU and MU?
The question becomes unavoidable when university statutes appear to be bypassed while the academic community remains largely silent. The issue is not about personalities. It is about legality, institutional autonomy and the future of higher education in Manipur.
University Acts are not optional guidelines. They are binding legal documents enacted by Parliament. If an Act clearly states that the “seniormost” professor should hold a position under certain circumstances, replacing that provision with the arbitrary selection of “a senior professor” changes the meaning of the law itself. Once interpretation begins to override the explicit wording of an Act, the law ceases to function as law and becomes subject to administrative convenience.
The recent developments have raised several troubling questions. An official order reportedly used the term “proposed” regarding an appointment. Proposed by whom? Under what provision of the University Act? Was the Executive Council consulted? Was due process followed? No clear answers have emerged.
Equally concerning is the phrase “till the appointment of a new VC.” Does this imply that if the appointment of a regular Vice-Chancellor is indefinitely delayed, the present appointee could continue endlessly regardless of retirement norms or service limitations? Such ambiguity strikes at the credibility of institutional governance.
But perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the entire episode is the silence of stakeholders who should have spoken first and loudest.
Where are the students’ bodies that once fought fiercely to defend university autonomy? Where are the scholars, intellectuals and senior academics who regularly speak on constitutional values and democratic rights? Most importantly, where is the stand of the teachers’ associations?
Teachers are not merely salaried employees. They are custodians of academic ethics and defenders of institutional integrity. If they remain silent when university laws are allegedly violated, it sends a dangerous message that academic institutions too have surrendered to the culture of political adjustment and personal survival.
The Manipur University Teachers’ Association and academic communities connected to NSU cannot remain spectators forever. Silence in moments of institutional crisis amounts to silent endorsement.
The danger extends far beyond one appointment. If laws governing the appointment of Vice-Chancellors can be bent today, tomorrow Deans may be appointed directly from Delhi irrespective of university statutes. Academic curricula, research priorities and administrative decisions may gradually move entirely outside university autonomy. Institutions established through Acts of Parliament could eventually become mere extensions of bureaucratic control.
Universities survive not through buildings or official orders, but through respect for law, procedure and academic independence. Once those foundations are weakened, the collapse of institutional credibility becomes inevitable.
The people of Manipur must ask difficult questions. If the law governing universities can be ignored without protest, then what remains of institutional democracy? If Parliament-enacted Acts can be selectively interpreted according to political convenience, then what protects the autonomy of educational institutions tomorrow?
The issue before NSU and MU is no longer administrative. It is constitutional, moral and historical.
And until clear answers emerge, one haunting question will continue to echo across the academic landscape of Manipur:
Who killed the law of NSU and MU?