PROF Mridula Mukherjee is all set to continue as director of the prestigious Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (NMML) here for at least two more years. At a special meeting convened on July 27, the Executive Council of the NMML, chaired by Dr Karan Singh, recommended that Prof Mukherjee, whose three-year deputation ended last week, be given a two-year extension.

The recommendation is at present with the Prime Minister’s Office, awaiting a final nod—though the NMML is an autonomous body whose affairs are ultimately managed by the eight-member Executive Council. Mukherjee was backed by all four members present at the meeting—the council has a quorum of four.

The other members of the council are the director, former-bureaucrat Anil Bordia, journalists Dilip Padgaonkar, Mammen Mathew and Suman Dubey as well as two representatives from the Ministry of Culture. As the meeting was held to discuss the future of the Director, Mukherjee chose to stay away from the meeting.

However, not everyone in the Council is not known to have favoured the extension of Mukherjee’s tenure, with one journalist member even threatening to walk out of the Council if the director was retained. But in the end Mukherjee’s name prevailed.

Earlier this year, historian Ramchandra Guha and other eminent scholars like Mukul Kesavan, Sunil Khilnani and Mushir-ul-Hasan had started a war of letters about the Mukherjee’s management of the institution. In reply, several public figures, Nehru fellows and others using the library, like historians Irfan Habib, Bipan Chandra, D N Jha Aruna Roy and Madhu Kishwar, wrote to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi making a case for Mukherjee’s extension.

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