NEW DELHI: The possible reason for the resignation of IIT-Delhi director RK Shevgaonkar could be his alleged involvement in illegally setting up an off-shore campus of the institute in Mauritius, top HRD ministry sources claimed on Sunday.A top HRD official insisted Shevgaonkar was cornered on the Mauritius issue. "We were asking him questions to which no satisfactory reply was forthcoming," he said. According to him, Shevgaonkar had taken the proposal of IIT-D campus in Mauritius to IIT Council which told him that the Institutes of Technology Act that governs IITs do not enable creation of offshore campuses. However, he said, Shevgaonkar went ahead and had Memorandum of Understanding with Tertiary Education Commission of Mauritius. The proposed institute was to be called International Institute of Technology Research Academy."We asked the director what is the commitment – financial or non-financial – from IIT-Delhi to the proposed campus. We also asked him to show any authorization from the HRD ministry. He could not produce any paper," the official said. IIT-Delhi was also asked if it had the clearance of the ministry of external affairs. "IIT-Delhi claimed they had MEA permission but again could not produce any evidence," the official said. Last month when HRD ministry found that MEA clearance was not there, it issued a circular to all higher educational institutions that prior permission of MEA and HRD would be needed for any offshore campus.HRD sources said even the copy of MoA that was provided by IIT-Delhi has two missing pages. "May be it is an inadvertent error but we asked for the missing pages three weeks back but it is yet to be received," a ministry official said.The ministry said even as none of the clearances were available, Shevgaonkar went ahead and gave an interview to a Mauritian daily in which he said students of the new institute will get the same degree as those given out at IIT, Delhi. He also said PhD students of the proposed students will have joint supervisor from IIT-Delhi and Mauritius.Despite repeated attempts by TOI, Shevgaonkar did not respond to the phone calls.Meanwhile, a senior member of the board of IIT-Delhi said, "Whatever be Shevgaonkar's alleged involvement with off-shore campus in Mauritius, there is no denying that he was under tremendous pressure from the HRD ministry. Such pressure does not come in writing. He had told us a lot about what happened to him when he went for a meeting to the HRD ministry. If views of department of personnel & training and finance ministry were being sought, why was a meeting organized between IIT officials and BJP leader Subramanian Swamy for settlement of his salary dues."But BJP national secretary Shrikant Sharma denied any pressure on Shevgaonkar to resign and called such allegations "baseless and a figment of imagination". He demanded a probe by an independent agency into the Mauritius campus issue and said some people were "mischievously" trying to give a political colour to the resignation.Meanwhile, Vijay Bhatkar, chairperson of the Board of Governors of IIT-Delhi, confirmed that Shevgaonkar resigned a week ago. His resignation has been accepted by the Board of Governors and forwarded to the HRD ministry.