Dhawankar is charged with threatening the seven heads of departments with making public the allegations of sexual exploitation against them
Nagpur: Following serious allegations against former Head of Nagpur University’s Mass Communication Department, Prof Dharmesh Dhawankar, Vice Chancellor Subhash Chaudhari on sacked him from the Public Relations Officer’s (PRO) charge, a media report said.
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25 April 2025
According to NU officials, the VC also issued a show cause notice to him seeking his explanation within three days. He assured the complainants — seven heads of NU’s various departments — of instituting a preliminary inquiry after Dhawankar filed his reply to the serious allegations levelled by them. The VC also assured to launch a Departmental Enquiry (DE) regarding the allegations that Dhawankar had collected Rs 15.50 lakh from the seven HODs under the pretext of settling the alleged complaints of sexual harassment lodged against them.
Dhawankar is charged with threatening the seven, almost all the heads of different departments, for making public allegations of sexual exploitation against them. They paid about Rs 16 lakhs to Dhanwankar. Surprisingly none of them formally enquired about the said complaint against them, with the university departments or officials and paid the amount.
The Vice-Chancellor of the University Dr Chaudhari has instituted enquiry against Dhawankar. . The inquiry started after four of the Dhawankar’s seven victims lodged a formal complaint with the Vice-Chancellor. Copies of the complaint were also forwarded to the Chancellor and Governor and the Chief Minister.
Even as the teachers had lodged the complaint on November 4, it was only after news published in the media that Chaudhari finally acted. NU officials said though he was apprised of the serious complaint and even a note-sheet was prepared from the Registrar’s office, the VC deliberately ignored it. The news was a hot topic of discussions at all NU campuses among the teachers, non-teaching staff and students as well.
According to the report, Dhawankar was on leave ever since he came to know about the complaint. The Nationalist Youth Congress, the youth wing of Sharad Pawar-led NCP, has demanded NU to lodge a police complaint against Dhawankar for such serious allegations involving financial transactions. Its president Shailendra Tiwari and activists, including Anil Bokde, Sumit Bodkhe Patil, Vishwajit Savadia, Nishant Nimje, Pranav Mhaisekar, Shital Kirjawalekar and others, warned NU administration that they will lodge the complaint if VC and other officials failed to do so.
Dhawankar, who is not new to the controversies, allegedly demanded Rs 10 lakh from each HOD for settling harassment complaints against them by a few girls stating that the VC had constituted a panel comprising two lawyers and him. The complainants included HODs of Public Administration — Jitendra Wasnik, Travel and Tourism — Priyadarshi Khobragade, Sociology — Ashok Borkar, Library Science — Satyaprakash Nikose, Economics — Satyaprakash Indurwade, Biosciences — Virendra Meshram and Marathi — Shailendra Lendhe.
