NEW DELHI, 9 July 2006 — With the Delhi High Court stay on his dismissal on Friday, All India Institute of Medical Sciences Director P. Venugopal resumed office yesterday morning.
His first major administrative decision of the day was serving a show cause notice to AIIMS Registrar V.P. Gupta.
On this, AIIMS spokesperson Shakti Gupta said: “Gupta has been served a show cause notice and asked to explain within two weeks the confusion regarding the release of salaries to the doctors who participated in the anti-quota agitation. Till then Gupta’s junior will take over his duties.”
Clarifying that the registrar has not been dismissed from his post, the spokesperson said: “When a show cause notice is served a person is asked to relinquish duty for the period he submits an explanation. This is standard practice.”
It may be noted that salaries of the doctors on strike over the reservation issue had been stopped for their striking period despite the court orders saying that no punitive action should be taken against them.
The salaries had been stopped as per the instructions of union Health Minister A. Ramadoss whose war with Venugopal over the latter’s demand for greater autonomy for the AIIMS led to his dismissal on Wednesday.
In response, Venugopal turned to the court on Thursday saying that he had been unfairly dismissed as he had not violated any code of conduct as claimed by the AIIMS governing body which, chaired by Ramadoss, moved the resolution for his dismissal.
Apart from slapping the action on the registrar, Venugopal cleared some files in his office yesterday, sources said.
“He came in at about 1200 hrs for about half an hour and cleared some files. There were some administrative issues which needed his immediate attention,” the sources said.
Venugopal remains persistent in his demand for autonomy of AIIMS. He has said that he will not compromise on the issue and will continue to fight for it. He also has asserted that he would ignore the “personal humiliation meted out to him.”
