A shattered windowpane at the law department of NBU. A Telegraph picture

Siliguri, May 11: A group of fourth-year LLB students of the law department of North Bengal University (NBU) went on the rampage today, demanding reassessment of their answer scripts.

The demand, a college source said, comes after nine out of 66 students of the fourth-year failed in their exams. While these nine still have the chance to sit for supplementary exams, three others have failed to clear the annual exams more than three times in the past four years, the source said. These three have reportedly lost the opportunity to take the exams anymore.

The protesters, allegedly belonging to the Students’ Forum, went to principal Gangotri Chakraborty’s chamber and demanded that the varsity should reassess their papers immediately. When Chakraborty said she could not help them in this matter, they resorted to ransack within minutes, breaking windowpanes and furniture, the source said.

The students had already submitted a memorandum to Chakraborty, after the results were announced in April-end, demanding reassessment of the papers.

“I had forwarded the memorandum, which I received on May 7, to the vice-chancellor. He is planning to convene a meeting with the board of studies on the issue,” Chakraborty said. “We asked the students to wait till Monday, but they refused to listen to us and ransacked the college.”

This is the second time that such an incident has happened in the past one month. Students of Jalpaiguri Law College conducted a similar raid at the institute on April 27.

“We have lodged a complaint with Matigara police and have named around five students,” said Tapash Chatterjee, the NBU registrar. “The vice-chancellor is out of station. Once he returns, an inquiry committee will be formed to investigate the incident. We have already suspended the five students named in the FIR and debarred them from entering the campus.”

Leaders of Students’ Forum, however, tried to clarify the act. “It would be wrong to lend a political colour to the incident,” said Alokesh Chakraborty, a leader of the Forum. “Some fourth year students had only shouted slogans demanding reassessment of their papers. Nothing was broken or destroyed.”

The SFI, which is in control of the union of the law department, however, blamed their opponents. “We condemn the act of vandalism conducted by the Students’ Forum,” said Sudip Roychoudhury, the Darjeeling district president of the SFI.