E-Paper
Panjab University students to intensify senate election protest
Students have announced that they will block Panjab University’s Gate Number 2, facing Sector 15, on November 26; they also organised a protest on the campus on Friday
Protesting the delay in senate elections and the FIR against them for trying to disrupt Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann’s event at Panjab University on November 13, students have decided to scale up their protest.
Students have announced that they will block varsity’s Gate Number 2, facing Sector 15, on November 26. They also organised a protest on the campus on Friday, burning effigies with pictures of PU vice-chancellor Renu Vig and chief of university security Vikram Singh.
The varsity had last week held meetings with the student representatives and proposed to set up a new committee with all stakeholders to suggest reforms for the senate body and to submit these to the chancellor — the Vice-President of India. However, students have rejected this proposal. The previous term of the senate had expired on October 31.
President of Students For Society (SFS), Sandeep said,“The university officials themselves are not clear on the rules. Any such committee would have to be constituted by the senate. We don’t recognise the authority of this proposed committee and have rejected this proposal.”
Sandeep is one of the 14 protesters who were booked by police on the basis of a complaint by PU.
The students, meanwhile, have also taken their protest to some of PU’s constituent colleges. Protests were recently organised at DAV College, Sector 10; Post Graduate Government College, Sector 11; and GGDSD College, Sector 32; to raise awareness among students regarding this issue.
Authorities maintain that they have written to the chancellor’s office numerous times regarding the issue, but they have yet to receive a response and as per rules, the senate elections can only be called only after permission from the chancellor.
With Lok Sabha’s winter session set to start from November 25, it is expected that members of Parliament (MPs) from Punjab will take up this issue.
