Kolkata: While hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) related to the alleged gang-rape of a 24-year-old student inside a law college campus in South Kolkata, the Calcutta High Court on Thursday ordered the state education department to close all union rooms in colleges and universities across the state with immediate effect.
The division bench comprising Justice Soumen Sen and Justice Smita Das De noted that the directive to shut down union rooms must be issued by the state's Higher Education Department.
However, the court allowed the union rooms to be used for official purposes only in exceptional circumstances, and strictly with prior written approval from the university registrar or the principal of the respective institution.
The bench clarified that the conditional exception for using union rooms would not apply to South Calcutta Law College, where the students' union room has already been sealed as part of the ongoing probe.
The main accused, Monojit Mishra—a former student and a former leader of the student wing of the Trinamool Congress Chhatra Parishad (TMCP)—is currently in police custody along with two senior students, Zaib Ahmed and Pramit Mukherjee.
Mishra has been accused of misusing the students’ union room in the past for extortion, intimidation, bullying and abusing junior students, according to reports.
Student union polls across many educational institutions in the state have been stalled for several years. The bench noted that at least two petitions demanding polls are pending and ordered the state government to submit an affidavit outlining its roadmap for conducting the overdue polls. The next hearing in the matter will take place on July 17.
