Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday directed the police to render all sorts of assistance to the interim Vice-Chancellor (V-C) and the other officials of the Rabindra Bharati University (RBU), ensuring their hassle-free entry and exit to the Jorasanko campus of the university.
The bench of Justice Biswajit Basu directed the Officer in-charge, Girish Park Police Station to render the said police assistance. The state has been directed to file a report before the regular Bench on Wednesday. The court observed that the persons concerned may have a right of demonstration but the same cannot be stretched to deny the entry of the vice-chancellor or the officials of the University to the campus. Following the court order, the V-C Shubhra Kamal Mukherjee was able to enter the campus, it was learnt. Mukherjee told the press: “This is an extremely unfortunate situation. They are preventing me from entering the place associated with the memory of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore. Isn’t this shocking for a Tagore lover? How can they do this?” He claimed that the students were young but they were aided by a section of non-teaching employees and apparently being instigated by “some other forces”.
The petitioners (RBU & others) had alleged that the security officer of the University had lodged a complaint with the concerned police stations but the police authorities are not taking any steps.
Members of the Trinamool Congress students’ wing locked the chamber of the V-C on Tuesday, alleging that he has been taking certain policy decisions which are beyond his powers. Mukherjee was not in his office on the Jorasanko campus when around 50 members of the Trinamool Chhatra Parishad staged a sit-in outside his room and locked on the door.