As it happened: ‘We are students and not coronavirus’
KU authorities ‘refuse’ to listen to students’ grievances
Srinagar: “I don’t want to listen anything. Stay away.” This is how a group of 5th semester undergraduates was greeted by Chief Proctor, Dr Showkat Ahmad Shah, at University of Kashmir on Monday.
Sensing Chief Proctor’s uneasiness — apparently practicing ‘social distancing’ — considered a strategy to limit the spread of COVID-19, one of the students in the group responded sarcastically, “We are students and not coronavirus!”
The college-going students had visited the main campus of Kashmir University (KU) to register their grievances with the concerned authorities but the Proctor allegedly shooed them away.
“As we assembled near the examination block, the proctor ordered the security guards to arrange police vehicles for removing us from the campus,” said a student, adding, it has always been a wish of students to hear or expect something comforting from the authorities at KU.
“When a police team arrived at the campus, an officer accompanying it lent a listening ear. He listened to our grievances and assured help,” the student added.
According to the students, KU had announced the evaluation status of 5th semester examination on February 29, 2020. “The evaluation status was full of discrepancies as the students who didn’t appear in the exam were awarded marks. Also, some students had scored 70 out of 60 marks,” the students alleged.
“While demanding the correction of discrepancies, we had staged a protest at the university campus on March 02. At that time, we were told by the authorities that our queries will be cleared within a week,” they said.
“Since the evaluation status is not the final result and it allows us to raise queries, we did register our queries with the authorities. But when the final result was announced on March14, the discrepancies remained unchanged an uncorrected,” they added.
The students said that they have now been asked by the authorities to submit a written application containing the queries and the new result will be uploaded on the website within 15 days.
“This is not the first time that we are facing an issue with the examination results. During our last four semesters as well, things didn’t go smooth,” they said.
Controller Examinations of the University of Kashmir didn’t respond to calls and texts seeking comment his comment over the issue.
However, Chief Proctor denied allegations of him of shooing the students away. “I had urged the students to not assemble at the varsity campus because of strict guidelines issued by the Union Territory administration in view of coronavirus threat,” he told ‘Kashmir Images’.
Akeel Rashid is News Editor of the Kashmir Images
He can be reached at [email protected]
