Teachers of Jadavpur University (JU) have warned to boycott the examination process if the institution gives in to some protesting engineering students' demands that the final semester exams be held online by reversing its decision to conduct the exercise offline. Some engineering students had gheraoed Vice-Chancellor Suranjan Das on campus for 10 hours on Monday, March 28, to press for their demands. On Tuesday, he did not attend work.
Terming the students' demand as "unjust", the Jadavpur University Teachers' Association (JUTA) and the institution's chapter of the All Bengal University Teachers' Association (ABUTA) said they will boycott the examination process if the decision to hold it offline is reversed. "JUTA has taken a unanimous decision to not take part of the process if the final semester engineering examination is conducted in the online mode, instead of the already adopted decision of the examination board to hold it offline on the campus this year as it will mean giving in to the unjust demand of a section of the pupils," the teachers' body's general secretary Partha Pratim Roy told PTI.
ABUTA also echoed JUTA in describing the students' demand as "unjust" and criticising the gheraoing of the VC. "Our member teachers will also refrain from participating in the examination process if it is conducted online," ABUTA spokesperson Goutam Maity said. Vice-Chancellor Das, however, said that the examination board's decision is final and will not be reversed. "We will not give in to such demands of the students. I have told them categorically during the gherao that the examination will be held offline this time," he said.
A spokesperson of FETSU (Faculty of Engineering and Technology Students' Union) said that as classes were held online for the last two years, the final semester examination should also be held online.
