Little-known general maintenance section tasked with removing graffiti
Times of India | 30 August 2026
Kolkata: A little-known but one of the important administrative sections of Jadavpur University (JU), the general maintenance office, shot into prominence after being given the charge of whitewashing the graffiti from the walls of the campus. The office with seven permanent staff and around 35 contractual workers operates out of a building opposite the playground.
On Saturday morning, two university staff from the section along with two daily-wage labourers were seen moving around the campus from one building to another and painting the graffiti on the walls with a white paint. “The general maintenance section was given the task to remove the graffiti from the walls to avoid controversy. They spotted them and the task of whitewashing was given to a contractor who assigned two daily-wage labourers,” said an official.
The group of four people took six hours to whitewash the graffiti on the campus. They started the operation from Aurobindo Bhavan, the main administrative building, where they painted a coat of white paint on a few slogans, then moved to different buildings around the campus such as the mechanical engineering dept, electrical engineering dept, Prayukti Bhavan, Technology Bhavan, Central library, PG Science building, World View, Nazrul Bhavan whitewashing other graffiti reading ‘Break Fascism with Red’, ‘Free Palestine’ and finally ending the job at Open Air Theatre (OAT) at 2 pm by removing the slogan ‘Fascists do not deserve democracy. They deserve a bullet in the head”.
A source said, “A group of 10 to 12 people did a recce for the past two days across the campus to spot all the graffiti and slogans that had been highlighted by CM Suvendu Adhikari in his X post and other controversial writings. It was a time-consuming task. After figuring out the spots we informed the authorities and on Friday, the administration gave the nod to whitewash the graffiti that CM highlighted and any other controversial writings and slogans.” A staff member said, “We also visited each and every hostel as CM in his X post and speech repeatedly said about slogans inside the hostel. But none of the hostels have any graffiti or slogans written on the walls.”