Sarojit

Calcutta/Suri, May 17: The technical education department today asked a polytechnic college in Suri to lodge an FIR against those involved in the alleged ragging of civil engineering student Sarojit Biswas.

Minister of state for technical education Chakradhar Maikap has also convened a meeting of principals of 44 polytechnic colleges next week to discuss “stringent measures” to stop ragging.

“We shall finalise a set of guidelines for all college principals to ensure prompt action on their part whenever an incident of harassment is reported to them,” Maikap said.

The minister’s move follows an order from the Supreme Court, which yesterday made it incumbent on educational institutions to file FIRs if incidents of harassment are brought to their notice.

“I have asked the Suri polytechnic authorities to file a fresh FIR against the students about whom a police complaint has been lodged by Sarojit’s relatives,” director of technical education Parijat De said in Calcutta.

Sarojit, a first-year student of Ramakrishna Silpa Vidyapith in Suri, quit the institute earlier this week. Last Friday, some seniors had scalded him with cigarette butts and banged his head against a wall. Fearing more torture, he fled the hostel.

His elder brother, Hiranmoy, said: “Initially, I thought of lodging a complaint with the college authorities against six students. But I changed my mind in the light of the Supreme Court’s order, according to which a college can itself file an FIR against errant students.”

He said one of his brothers who had gone to bring back Sarojit had lodged a complaint against the six students. “Let the college authorities haul them up.”

In Suri, a seven-member committee formed to probe the alleged harassment on Sarojit has questioned 75 boarders of the college hostel.