VBU student’s death: Students hold protest outside VC residence, break outer gate

Also on Friday night, West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar tweeted that the VBU VC had sent an urgent message to the chief superintendent of police citing a threat to his life.

“VC Vishwa Bharati message sent to CS for intervention, ‘Kindly send security. My life is at risk. The agitators have broken the main gate and an untoward incident is likely to happen if you don’t send police protection for me. It is an SOS. Bidyut Chakrabarty’, CS response, ‘Sir, I have got the information. Have alerted DGP ,DM and SP .Will follow up. Regards,” the Governor tweeted.

Following the protest, police personnel were sent outside the VC’s residence on campus. Three persons have been detained in connection with the incident.

The students later withdrew their protest while slamming the VC for not meeting the father of the class 12 student.
On Saturday morning, police personnel were seen not allowing any motorcycles to be parked near the VC’s residence and keeping a close watch on activities on campus.

On Friday, a class 12 student of ‘Patha Bhavana’, a school run by VBU, was found dead in his hostel room.

A varsity official said the student, hailing from Nanur in Birbhum district, was found lying motionless in his hostel room and was taken to Pearson Memorial Hospital at Santiniketan where the doctors declared him dead. The body was then sent to Bolpur sub-divisional hospital for post-mortem.

The 17-year-old student’s father filed a complaint at Santiniketan Police Station alleging that there was an attempt by the university to suppress facts as his son was murdered. The university authorities have launched an inquiry to find out the circumstances behind the student’s death.

Meanwhile, a section of students affiliated to SFI took the student’s mortal remains outside the VC’s residence. The student’s father wanted to meet the VC to talk about the incident but the latter allegedly refused to meet the former. It resulted in a protest by the students who also broke open an outer gate. They later staged a sit-in outside his residence.

On Saturday, the student’s father demanded a CBI inquiry into his son’s death. “There is some mystery behind the death of my son. I think only a CBI probe will bring out the truth,” the father said.

Meanwhile, senior TMC leader and state minister Chandranath Sinha met the family on Saturday and extended his condolences. “We stand by the family in this time of tragedy. We will provide all support to them. We want the truth to come out,” Sinha said.

BJP national secretary Anupam Hazra criticised the vice-chancellor for not meeting the student’s family. “The vice-chancellor should have shown a human face and met the family. This is expected of a vice-chancellor of a university such as Visva-Bharati. We learn the values of humanity from a professor. Therefore, he should have been sensitive in the matter,” Hazra said.

The VC said, “I tried to meet them (the student’s family) but they were not in a position to talk. This is a tragic incident and we fully sympathise with the family. The university has extended all help to the family. We also arranged to send the student’s mother to a hospital as she was not feeling well.”