College Street: A fact-finding committee of Calcutta University has failed to establish whether a ragging complaint lodged by four boarders at New Law College Hostel is true but has recommended that the first-year students be segregated from their seniors, sources said.
Students pursuing courses in law and Sanskrit stay at the hostel on Bidhan Sarani, in north Calcutta.
Four students of the Sanskrit department staying at the hostel had on November 9 complained to vice-chancellor Sonali Chakravarti Banerjee that they had been ragged by some law students.
The university set up the fact-finding committee - comprising registrar Rajagopal Dhar Chakraborti and deputy inspector of colleges Nishat Alam - on November 16 in response to the complaint.
The committee, which handed its report to the VC on November 20, has failed to conclude whether the four students had been ragged, officials said.
"The committee has recommended an inquiry into the allegation of the four students by the university's anti-ragging cell. It has also suggested that first-year students at the hostel be segregated from the seniors to minimise chances of ragging," an official said.
"If the first-year students stay together, say on the first floor or in a particular wing, a camaraderie and a special bond will develop among them. That will make them less vulnerable to ragging by seniors," the official said.
Ideally, a CU official said, the first-year students should not be made to share a hostel with seniors. "But that arrangement is impossible now because of paucity of space. So, segregation is the best option for the time being," an official said.
Jadavpur University has a block in the main hostel reserved for freshers.
The superintendent of New Law College Hostel does not stay on the premises, a reason the authorities think why discipline cannot be enforced on the campus.
"A residential superintendent will be in a better position to prevent ragging and other instances of lawlessness," the official said.
Two of the complainants who had left the hostel after the alleged ragging returned to the premises last week. "I have assured them of full security," registrar Dhar Chakraborti said. "The report has come in a sealed envelope. The anti-ragging cell will go through its content first," the VC said.