Jadavpur University students on Monday walked out of a meeting convened by vice-chancellor Abhijit Chakrabarti to discuss the upcoming campus elections.

But it would not affect the polls scheduled for January 21 and 28, university authorities said.

VC Chakrabarti went ahead with the meeting attended by a lone representative of the Trinamul Congress Chhatra Parishad (TMCP) and university officials. Representatives of other students' organisations refused to attend the meeting citing the presence of Chakrabarti, whose resignation they have been demanding.

The customary meeting was convened to discuss the schedule of withdrawing nomination papers and to take stock of the election preparedness.

The representatives of SFI, Festsu, DSO entered the meeting venue, committee room No. 1 on the ground floor of administrative headquarters Aurobindo Bhavan, at 2.30pm.

Deputy commissioner (eastern suburban division) Santosh Pandey, representing Calcutta police, and university officials, including registrar Pradip Ghosh, entered the room around the same time.

Ten minutes later VC Chakrabarti walked in. As he settled into a chair, student representatives, many of who wore a badge saying ' Aamra VC r padatyag chai' (we want VC's resignation) announced they would not be part of a meeting where Chakrabarti was present.

All the representatives, barring the TMCP one, walked out en masse.

In December, students had attended two meetings of the election committee as pro-VC Ashish Swarup Verma represented the VC. Chakrabarti by virtue of his post heads the election committee. He had delegated power to the pro-VC to represent him in the meetings.

Chakrabarti on Monday claimed he had delegated power on the earlier occasions as he was not present on the campus. 'Today I was present... therefore I attended the meeting,' he said at a press conference, convened in his chamber, after the meeting.

Asked if the walk-out would derail the election, Chakrabarti said: 'I am not a legal expert. But I don't think this (walk-out) would create any hurdle in holding the election.'

Tanmay Roy, the general secretary of the DSO unit on the campus, said: 'We had told the university authorities that if Chakrabarti attended the meeting, we would walk out of it. He left us with no choice by attending it.'

Gitosri Sarkar, the student who had refused to accept her medal for best all-round graduate from the chancellor at the convocation as a mark of protest against the VC said: 'The dates have been announced. The election notification has been issued, too. We fail to figure out why this meeting was convened. If the VC wants to stall the election using the excuse of students walking out of the meeting, he has to face the consequences.'

Sarkar was part of a delegation that submitted a memorandum to the registrar explaining why they walked out of the meeting.

Students said they would intensify their protest, seeking the VC's resignation, in the run up to the election.