Kolkata, 27 September

Students of Kolkata’s Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute (SRFTI) have alleged that the external organisers of a consumer awareness programme being held on the campus on Sunday assaulted them, pelting stones and verbal insults such as “cockroach” and “anti-national,” when students attempted to put up posters against the event.

The programme was organised by the West Bengal arm of the Akhil Bharatiya Grahak Panchayat (ABGP), a national-level consumer organisation.

SRFTI Student Union Additional General Secretary Poorvi told Salar News that students were putting up posters outside the campus’s Main Theatre, where the event was taking place, around 2 pm on Sunday, as the student body had allegedly not been informed of outsiders coming onto campus to hold the event.

She said the organisers began aggressively shouting at them, which escalated into a physical altercation. Students’ t-shirts were torn, and some students were chased to the library by the organisers. Police arrived but allegedly did not intervene.

“We were pushed, attacked and hit. Some students were injured badly enough to be hospitalised,” said Poorvi, “We eventually managed to push the attackers outside the main gate of the campus, but they called more people who gathered outside.”

Poorvi said the students who live on campus in hostels are now afraid, as there is a mob surrounding the institute.

Nachiket Neelima, General Secretary of the SRFTI Student Union, accused the registrar of the institution, as well as the police, of inaction.

“We approached the registrar, questioning how outsiders were allowed to hold an event in students’ spaces, but he refused to come meet us,” he told Salar News.

Neelima added that female students formed a human chain to evacuate women and children attending the event, but that some of the women refused to leave.

“We asked the police to bring female officials to evacuate them, but they didn’t listen to us,” he claimed.

Dr. Pankaj Kumar Roy, who serves as the West Bengal State President of the ABGP, told reporters, “The images of Bharat Mata and Swami Vivekananda were tampered with.”

He also said that the Consumer Affairs department will demand compensation as the organisation had rented out the Main Theatre for Rs 15,000, adding that members of the organisation were injured and hospitalised during the altercation.

“They came up to us with rods and lathis. We have videos, and we will make them go viral,” he added.

The union held a general body meeting in the evening, said Neelima, in which it was decided

to demand the resignation of the registrar. Students contacted the Vice-Chancellor of the university, senior Indian Information Service officer Santosh Ajmera, to come to campus to ensure the security of students, Neelima added.

The union further released a statement on the incident, saying that misinformation was being circulated about it.