Mumbai: Students of the prestigious Banaras Hindu University (BHU) on Tuesday staged a demonstration outside the house of the university’s Vice-Chancellor Rakesh Bhatnagar over reports of an internal proposal to appoint Nita Ambani, chairperson and founder of Reliance Foundation, as a visiting professor.
Recently, the university’s Social Sciences faculty had considered a proposal to ask Nita Ambani to join the university as a visiting faculty at their Women Study Centre.
One of the protesting students told PTI that instead of Nita Ambani, those who have set an example of women empowerment should be invited as guest faculty.
While speaking to The Indian Express, Kaushal Kishore Mishra, Dean of the Social Sciences Faculty, said, “We do academic and research work related to women empowerment, along with graduation and post-graduation courses. Following the BHU tradition of involving philanthropic industrialists, we sent a letter to the Reliance Foundation asking Nita Ambani to join the Women Study Centre as a visiting professor so that we can benefit from her experience. We did this because the Reliance Foundation has done a lot of work in the field of women empowerment.”
Responding to the reports, Reliance Industries Limited spokesperson told news agency ANI: “Reports that Nita Ambani will be a visiting lecturer at Banaras Hindu University are fake. She hasn’t received an invitation.”
However, it is not just Nita Ambani who was considered for an invitation. For two other posts, the university had considered Priti Adani, the wife of billionaire industrialist Gautam Adani, and Usha Mittal, the wife of UK-based steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, authorities said.
(With agency inputs)