Will seek council meeting on student elections: Senior Jadavpur University officials
Telegraph | 12 March 2025
Senior Jadavpur University officials and students’ representatives were locked in a meeting till past 10pm on Monday to find ways to resolve the impasse on the campus.
The meeting ended at 11.30pm. It resolved that JU would stick to its tradition of not calling police to the campus. “If the police were to come to the campus at all, they must inform the JU authorities and seek permission. On Monday, when the police came to the campus, the university authorities were not informed,” the official said.
It was also resolved that the JU authorities will request the state government so an emergency meeting of JU’s executive council can be called.
“The meeting would discuss students’ demands about campus polls. We are likely to make an appeal to the state government so the elections could be held,” the official said.
At the meeting, the students urged the university authorities to see that they were not harassed by the police, said a JU official.
Some Left and ultra-Left students, who had allegedly heckled education minister Bratya Basu on campus on March 1, have received notices from the police after pro-Trinamul teachers on the campus lodged FIRs against the harassment.
The official said: “Pro vice-chancellor Amitava Dutta called the officer-in-charge of Jadavpur police station around 8.30pm, urging him not to harass them. He also told them the cops have seized the phones of many of the students as part of the probe. He requested the officer if the phones could be returned.”
Calls to pro-VC Dutta went unanswered.
The students told the JU authorities to take steps for the immediate resumption of campus polls.
“We have heard what they had to say. At the most we can make a fresh plea to the state government so the campus elections can be held in JU. But it is for the government to decide,” said the official.
JU’s authorised VC Bhaskar Gupta, who was discharged from hospital on Sunday and could not attend Monday’s meeting physically or virtually because of health reasons, told Metro on Sunday: “I can request the state government to seek a resumption of the campus polls.”
On a day the meeting was held, the police came to the campus to protect pro-Trinamul professor Om Prakash Mishra, who was prevented by SFI supporters from reaching his office.
At the meeting, many students’ representatives sought to know from the authorities why the police were called to the campus.
Anushna Das, one of the student protesters, said: “We asked the authorities why the police were called to campus. We wanted a copy of the order... issued to call the police to the campus. We have told the authorities that students won’t approve of the presence of the police on campus.”