Many threaten to boycott exam after 7 students test Covid +ve

LUCKNOW : Seven students of Dr Ram Manohar Lohiya (RML) National Law University here tested positive for Covid on Monday, said university vice chancellor prof SK Bhatnagar. District health education officer Yogesh Raghuvanshi said, “In all, 140 samples were collected a day before of which seven came positive. At present, those who tested negative have also been isolated while those who tested positive are under medical observation and are staying separately. About 200 more samples have been taken.”

However, the university went ahead with its ongoing exams even as some students threatened to boycott examination in view of the Covid scare. In the first shift, exams were held for BA-LLB first and third semesters, LLM second semester while in the second shift there were exams for fourth, eighth and tenth semester students.

University registrar Anil Mishra said, “A number of students appeared in the exam. A separate arrangement was made for those who had tested positive and two of them appeared in the exam. A medical team from CMO office issued advisory following which exams were held.”

Meanwhile, some students claimed that majority of them boycotted exams alleging that the university administration made no attempts to contain the pandemic. They also alleged that the university even forced them to appear in the end semester examination on Monday.

University officials, however, said a few students got scared.

“We have just finished an hour-long meeting with the V-C and the registrar. The administration turned a deaf ear to our concerns. The closing of university is in the hands of CMO and university even refused to give any interim relief by deferring exams. They are waiting for the test results to come and after that only they’ll analyse the situation (by Tuesday evening),” the students claimed.

“Apart from that, they have asked to prepare for the next exam (on Wednesday),” they claimed. The students further alleged that the university administration made no efforts to reach out to the students. On the contrary, they alleged, the university was encouraging students to appear in the offline examination which means a large number of students have to sit together to write their papers.