Gandhi

Calcutta, April 5: Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi has persuaded the students of Bengal Engineering and Science University (Besu) to go back to classes from Monday.

Gandhi, also the chancellor of the university, had spoken to students’ representatives yesterday, urging them to keep faith in the one-man commission that will probe the reasons behind the campus unrest.

“To honour the chancellor’s request, we have decided to go back to our classes,” said Shyamasis Das, a fourth-year student.

The students also decided to temporarily withdraw their hunger strike after the university authorities put up a notice citing inability to provide security after 5pm.

“We had to temporarily withdraw our relay hunger strike after we saw the notice because we apprehended trouble,” Das said.

Hours before the governor’s appeal around 6.30 last evening, alumni of the university, including former IIT Kharagpur director Amitava Ghosh, adjunct professor Dipak Sengupta and former IIT professor Jamini Das, had met the students.

“We told the students that they should go back to their classes and continue to press for their demands through talks with the one-man commission and with the vice-chancellor. The students were most responsive,” Sengupta said.

The students want the university to withdraw the FIRs against students, get police off the campus, announce students’ union polls and take action against those who triggered the campus clashes.