Kolkata: Several students of the prestigious Jadavpur University here had to be hospitalised after police allegedly beat them up early yesterday for laying siege to the vice chancellor’s office seeking a fresh inquiry into the purported sexual harassment of a female student.
With the authorities drawing all-round flak, a senior state minister conceded that the police should have been “more restrained”.
While 35 students were arrested and later released by police, there have been allegations that “outsiders” teamed up with the security personnel in assaulting the students, with several female pupils even molested.
The police crackdown has attracted widespread criticism with students, teachers, eminent personalities and political leaders demanding the resignation of vice-chancellor (VC) Abhijit Chakrabarty, who claimed he was compelled to call police fearing for his life.
Rubbishing students’ claims that they were assaulted by police, Chakrabarty said that the police and he himself were under attack.
“Police did not assault them. Rather the students attacked me, my security. I had to call the police fearing for my life,” claimed Chakrabarty, who was confined in his office along with other top university officials since Tuesday by students demanding a fresh inquiry into the accusation that a student was sexually harassed on the campus last month.
Chakrabarty later said he had informed Education Minister Partha Chatterjee about the incident and claimed the gherao was a “conspiracy where many outsiders were involved”.
Chatterjee, however, disapproved of the VC’s confinement. “Students should behave like students. One cannot support the gherao of the VC,” he said.
Besides registering a complaint against university officials for the assault and alleged molestation, students and teachers later took out a protest rally seeking Chakrabarty’s resignation. A host of eminent personalities, including actor Kaushik Sen and former Naxal leader Ashim Chatterjee, participated in the march.
Deputy Commissioner of Police Santosh Pandey confirmed the complaint against Chakrabarty.
IANS
