HCU: acting VC says students ready to allow classes to resume

The acting Vice Chancellor of Hyderabad Central University M Periasamy today said the students who are agitating in the wake of suicide by Dalit research scholar Rohith Vemula had agreed to allow the classes and administrative activities to resume normally from tomorrow.

The varsity has been roiling with agitation ever since Vemula's suicide on January 17.
The students, however, said final decision would be taken at the meeting of the Joint Action Committee for Social Justice (which is heading the agitation) this evening.

"We had a meeting with student (JAC) representatives. They agreed to allow regular functioning from tomorrow. This is a conditional agreement," Periasamy told PTI.

"They wanted that some of the individuals involved in this punishment (suspension of Vemula and four others over alleged assault on an ABVP leader) should not be in the decision-making body or the administration, and all the SC/ST faculty members who have quit the administrative duties should resume their duties. We agreed to that," he said.
A JAC member said the students were not against the resumption of classes but they would take decision at a meeting of JAC in the evening.

The in-charge VC said he would request the SC/ST faculty members to take up their administrative duties once again.

As demanded by the JAC, some staff members would be taken off administrative duties, he added.

"Taking action against some of the individuals is not in our hands, it is under HRD ministry or the Government. There are some protocols which we cannot change just like that, but we can persuade people to keep away from administration till the judicial commission (set up by the Union HRD Ministry) clears them," he said.

Periasamy took charge after the VC Vipin Srivastava proceeded on leave a day before yesterday. Srivastava had been given charge after the Vice Chancellor Apparao Polide went on leave following the controversy over Vemula's suicide, but the students didn't approve of Srivastava's appointment either.

Periasamy also said he had directed the finance department to ensure release of salaries of the staff and stipends, fellowships of students by tomorrow evening.