KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 17): The High Court here denied a judicial review application brought by a lecturer from Universiti Malaya (UM) against the university and a faculty dean pertaining to the rejection of her postgraduate application under the Skim Latihan Akademik IPTA (SLAI).
High Court judge Datuk Ahmad Kamal Md Shahid dismissed Associate Professor Dr Prema Sukumaran’s application for the judicial review, surmising that her application had no merit.
Ahmad Kamal then ordered the associate professor as the applicant to pay costs of RM10,000 to the respondents.
Dr Prema applied for the judicial review on claims that her application to pursue her PhD in King's College London was rejected due to personal prejudice against her.
She named UM and the dean of the Faculty of Dentistry, Professor Dr Zamri Radzi, in her judicial review application.
Dr Prema was seeking a sum of more than RM3.1 million for the rejection of her SLAI application, and a further rejection of her application for CBBPTB (full pay study leave without scholarship) whereby a member of the faculty will be paid his or her salary while pursuing further studies.
In her judicial review application sighted by The Edge, Dr Prema contended that Dr Zamri had illegally rejected her applications, even though she fulfilled the criteria for both the SLAI and CBBPTB applications.
Dr Prema claimed that Dr Zamri rejected the applications on personal prejudice against her.
Dr Prema, through her lawyers, contended that the actions by Dr Zamri and UM were contravention of Articles 5, 8 and 136 of the Federal Constitution and Section 8 of UM’s constitution, all of which prohibit discrimination and/or differential treatment on the basis of race.
She further contended that Dr Zamri and UM acted in bad faith in rendering the rejection decisions for both the SLAI and the CBBPT, and that the decisions were unlawful.
Dr Prema claimed that as a result, she had to spend RM1.46 million for her PhD. She was seeking UM to pay her the sum of RM3.125 million or any other sum as determined by the court.
On the decision dated Jan 9, Justin TY Voon, Abu Daud Abd Rahim and Khairunnajihah Aqila Mohd Sofian from Messrs Azmi & Associates represented UM and the faculty dean.
Dr Prema was represented by law firm Messrs Lavania and Balan Chambers.