Jadavpur University gherao ends after 54 hours; governor meets students

With the intervention of governor K.N. Tripathi, the agitating students at Jadavpur University lifted their gherao after holding the vice-chancellor, registrar and other university teachers hostage for 54 hours.

The impasse at the university came to an end after Mr Tripathi, who is also the chancellor of the university, convened a meeting with the university delegation, elected members of students’ union bodies and other students’ organisations at Raj Bhawan on Monday to discuss the issue of holding the students union election. The agitating students, however, threatened to launch another round of agitation if the meeting failed to yield a result.

This was the longest gherao by students at Jadavpur University.

In 2010, JU vice-chancellor P.N. Ghosh and his colleagues were held captive for over 52 hours because the students were opposed to the installation of CCTV cameras on the campus. JU’s former VC Souvik Bhattacharyya had quit and returned to IIT-Kharagpur after being held hostage for over 50 hours because the students wanted him to withdraw the punishment meted out to two students found guilty of ragging in 2013.

“We have been demanding that the date of the proposed meeting be announced and we are happy that it has been done at last. In response to the appeal made by the chancellor, we are withdrawing our agitation and will participate in tomorrow’s meeting. But it should be a tripartite meeting otherwise we would launch our movements again,” an agitating student said.

The agitating students have been demanding that the students’ union election be held in February and accused the university authorities of compromising the university’s autonomy by not issuing the notification for campus polls. Ignoring the repeated requests by university authorities to participate in a discussion, the students refused to lift the gherao as the date for the meeting was not announced.

Speaking to reporters after the withdrawal of the agitation which started Friday evening, vice-chancellor Suranjan Das said, “As a teacher, my duty is to make the students understand and sometimes it takes time. We are grateful to the chancellor that he has responded to our appeal and convened a meeting. He has initiated a dialogue process which is very important in a democratic structure. We must seize this opportunity to find a solution to the issue.”

Soon after returning from Chennai, Mr Tripathi had a telephonic conversation with Prof Das and asked him to convey his message to the agitating students. However, the students refused to participate in the meeting as the chancellor wanted to only speak with the representatives of elected student bodies of the university. Buckling under the pressure of the students’ movement, the chancellor finally agreed to talk to meet the representatives of other students’ organisation.

However, the gherao forced the university officials to cancel their scheduled trip to China to sign MOUs with Chinese universities.