Tension prevailed amid protests and police deployment at Visva-Bharati in Bengal’s Birbhum district on Saturday, two days after a student was found hanging in a hostel room with his parents claiming that he was murdered and that the university was trying to hush up the matter. The deceased was a Class 12 student of ‘Patha Bhavana’, a school run by the institution.
Protests have rocked the university campus over the past two days as the boy’s parents along with other students demanded an audience with vice chancellor Bidyut Chakrabory, seeking to know more about the 17-year-old’s demise. Some of the agitators had broken open the lock of the main gate outside the VC’s residence.
A team of police officers has been deployed outside the VC’s residence to avoid any gathering there, a university official said. The boy’s parents have filed a complaint at Santiniketan police station, alleging that their child was murdered and the Visva-Bharati authorities was trying to suppress the case.
Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar had earlier tweeted that the VC sent him SOS seeking urgent police protection in view of the agitation. He had asked Chief Secretary H K Dwivedi to take immediate action in this regard. “VC Vishwa Bharati msg sent to CS for intervention @WBPolice, Dhankhar wrote.
Amid allegations by a section of protesters that he was not responsive to the agony of the boy’s family, Chakraborty had earlier said that he did everything to ensure that the parents face no difficulty. “I had rushed the boy to Pearson Memorial Hospital from his hostel room and instructed the Visva-Bharati employees to ensure his parents did not face any difficulty. I could not talk to them immediately due to the tense situation,” he told reporters on Saturday.
BJP national secretary Anupam Hazra said in a Facebook post that the VC should have met the parents of the student. “This is what we expect from a teacher, this is what is least expected from a teacher,” Hazra said. An infuriated Chakrabarty responded to the post saying “Hazra, a former MP of Bolpur and ex-faculty of the institute, should have checked facts before making sweeping comments”.
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