Senate House siege: Eastern Uni to close if students don’t evacuate

The Eastern University would be closed until further notice if the students did not evacuate the administrative building ‘Senate House’ following a court order which would be issued today (11), University Deputy Vice Chancellor Dr. K. E. Karunakaran said.

He said the students had launched a protest over several demands including the provision of adequate hostel facilities and this protest at Senate Hall had been ongoing since Tuesday (8).

“We hope that a court order would be issued today to evacuate the students from Senate House. If not the university administration will have to take a decision to close the university until further notice,” Dr. Karunakaran said.

According to him the students had not kept anyone captive but camped inside Senate House making it difficult for anyone to go in or out of the building.

“Hostel accommodation was given to First Year and Final Year students at the university. However, last year we agreed to provide accommodation to Year 2 students as well by providing hostel facilities to them in hostels rented outside the university premises. This year too students were advised to leave the hostel at the end of the first year and apply for residence if they needed one. They were issued individual letters to this effect,” he said.

However, these students had chosen not to do this and had continued to stay in the hostels by force, making the allocation of hostel facilities for incoming students impossible. “We had no choice but to make these premises out of bounds to these students, which imposes restrictions on academic activities, including appearing for examinations,” he said.