Salt Lake: The search committee for the first vice-chancellor of Biswa Bangla University has three weeks to recommend names for the post.

A notification issued by higher education secretary R.S. Shukla on March 8 states that the search committee will submit its recommendation "within three weeks from the date of issue of this notification". Shukla acts as secretary to governor Keshari Nath Tripathi, who is the chancellor of all state universities.

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee had announced setting up of the university at a programme of college and university teachers at Netaji Indoor stadium on January 7, 2017.

The university is set to come in the Bolpur sub-division of Birbhum. The only other university in the region is Visva-Bharati.

The Biswa Bangla Biswabidyalay Bill was passed in the Assembly in November 2017 along with three other university bills.

A higher education department official said the deadline was in consonance with what has been stated in one of the sections of the university act.

"The chancellor shall, within three months from the date of publication of the Act in the official gazette, appoint a person to be the vice-chancellor of the university in consultation with the minister in charge (Partha Chatterjee)," states Section 62(1) of the Biswa Bangla Biswabidyalay Act, 2017. The act was notified on January 9, 2018.

The three-month deadline lapses on April 9.

The fast-tracking of the search exercise stands out as the higher education department has constituted search committees for four new universities recently but none of them have been set such a short deadline.

"The section of the Act stands out. In the Acts of the other universities, there is no mention of such a deadline for appointment of VC," the official said.

The search committee comprises Dipak Ranjan Mandal, the vice-chancellor of Sidho Kanho Birsha University; Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury, the vice-chancellor of Rabindra Bharati University; and Anuradha Lohia, the vice-chancellor of Presidency University.