Sayandip: Stirring a storm

Jalpaiguri, Aug. 29: Enraged by the rejection of the bail application of four of their colleagues for the second time, the students of Jalpaiguri Government Engineering College today declared an indefinite strike in the institute to press their demand for the release of the quartet arrested on charges of ragging a first-year boy.

Standing by the behind-bars budding engineers who were expelled from the college after the charges brought by Sayandip Bandopadhyay, students’ union spokesman Tamojit Chakraborty said the boys should be released immediately as “they were innocent and had been framed”.

“After the rejection of the second bail application, we decided to launch a movement. As the first step, we have called an indefinite strike in the college until the four are released,” he said.

Chakrobarty added that first-year students, who were not called to join in the strike, had decided to participate on their own. “We asked students from second-year upwards to join in the strike. But the first-year students approached us this morning and said they were with us.”

The ragging row erupted on August 6, when Sayandip, a Calcutta boy who had come to study electronics and communications, lodged a complaint with the Kotwali police station, alleging that he had “tortured and made to write a suicide note” by his seniors the night before.

Based on his complaint, police arrested four senior students — Parashar Kishore Singh, Nigam Prasad Kundu, Subhadip Naha and Mainak Choudhury. The next day, they were produced before the subdivisional judicial magistrate, who remanded them in jail custody for 14 days. The first bail plea was rejected on August 22 and the second met with the same fate yesterday.

“This repeated rejection of bail has forced us to launch the movement. They are not hardened criminals but mere students,” said a student.

The students said they would accompany the boys’ parents to Calcutta where they will move the high court and meet the higher education minister.

Classes remained suspended in the college today. Principal Shyam Sunder Chatterjee said he would hold discussions with the students tomorrow.