3 expelled over alleged assault of AUD VC, registrar

On April 11, there was a clash between protesting students and university authorities at the Kashmere Gate campus.

Dr BR Ambedkar University Delhi (AUD) has expelled three students and debarred two others — all affiliated to the Students’ Federation of India (SFI) — from re-admission in connection with the alleged assault on the vice chancellor and registrar during a protest in April this year.

Following the April protest, all five students had been suspended but were permitted to sit for their end-semester exams. (HT Archive)

On April 11, there was a clash between protesting students and university authorities at the Kashmere Gate campus.

According to the order issued to second-year Environment and Development student Shefali on September 25, “…an act of grave indiscipline involving violence was reported, whereby Ms. Shefali pushed the security staff, attempted to physically assault the vice chancellor and registrar’s official car leading to damage to public property…. Hence the name is struck out from the rolls of the university forthwith.” The letter was signed by the registrar and secretary of the Board of Management.

Shefali, who is among the three expelled, said, “Three students from SFI had exposed a case of cyber-bullying in the Karampura campus of AUD in February, following which they had been suspended for a year. In April, SFI activists had called an indefinite hunger strike in the Kashmere Gate campus regarding the same.”

Another expelled student Shubhojeet Dey, a PhD scholar in Development Studies, said, “On Monday, we submitted a memorandum to the Lieutenant Governor (who is Chancellor of AUD), appealing to him to step in and accommodate nullification of the order.”

Following the April protest, all five students had been suspended but were permitted to sit for their end-semester exams. Two of them have since graduated, and the university has now debarred them “from entering all campuses of AUD and from admissions to higher studies at AUD forthwith.”

Dey said the affected students would pursue legal relief. “We will be approaching the high court again and file a petition for the reversal of this decision. We are also ready to approach the Supreme Court to defend the students’ fundamental rights.”