Security personnel in front of the Gauhati Commerce College on Monday. Picture by Biju Boro

Jan. 5: Errant students of Gauhati Commerce College today disrupted the higher secondary (first year) test examination in protest against the management’s decision to bar those students whose attendance were below the stipulated norms from sitting for the examination.

The examination, which was scheduled to start at 9 am, commenced at 11 am with police protection.

“A group of students, led by College Students Union general secretary Bidyut Chakraborty, prevented students from entering the college and threatened them with dire consequences if they took the examination. As a result, most of the examinees stood outside the gate,” principal G. Nath alleged.

The examination could begin only after Chandmari police personnel arrived with a magistrate and dispersed the errant students. However, quite a few students had left by then. As a result, only 370 of the 453 students appeared for their general English paper.

The principal, however, said since it was a test examination, the college management would consider the cases of those students who could not appear in today’s exam provided they appear in tomorrow’s exam.

Nath later said the examination would not have been disrupted if Chandmari police had promptly reacted to his call for protection. “Anticipating trouble after the students were prevented from filling the forms on Saturday, I had requested Chandmari police that day to deploy some police. But they did not. Even today, the police came only after I took up the matter with the city superintendent of police,” he said.

The college management has now requested the city police to deploy personnel in the educational institution from 8 am to 5 pm till Saturday for the smooth conduct of the examinations.

For the higher secondary and first year degree students, attendance should be at least 10 per cent while for second and third year degree classes the minimum attendance should be 5 per cent, the principal said.

“In any case we are not very strict with the attendance. But if students do not even attend 10 and 5 per cent of the classes, how can we allow them to appear in the exams?” Nath asked.