Representatives of some of the social organisations of the Rajbanshi community have demanded that the vice-chancellor of the Cooch Behar Panchanan Barma University (CBPBU) should be someone from the community only.

On Sunday, at a news conference here, they said they would write to chief minister Mamata Banerjee, requesting her to consider the demand.

“We, the Rajbanshis, represent around 60 per cent of Cooch Behar and want the chief minister and the state education department to depute a Rajbanshi academician in the vice-chancellor’s post of the varsity. It will also be a homage to Thakur Panchanan Barma (the tallest statesman of the community),” said Ratan Barma, secretary, the Rajbanshi Employees’ Welfare Association.

The demand follows a recent order of the Supreme Court, which said that Sanchari Mukherjee, a senior faculty member of the North Bengal University and also a former VC of Raiganj University, would be appointed as the new VC of CBPBU.

In the same order, the apex court also instructed Sonali Chakraborty Bandyopadhyay would be the new VC of Rabindra Bharati University, Calcutta.

Rajbanshi outfits underscored that the CBPBU was named after Panchanan Barma, the social reformer who had worked for the socio-economic development of the Rajbanshi community throughout his life.

“But unfortunately, no full-time vice-chancellor, who is also a Rajbanshi, has been posted in the varsity named after him,” Ratan Barma added.

Partha Barman, secretary of the Biswa Rajbanshi Unnayan Mancha, said many erudite and competent persons in the community could become the vice-chancellor.

“But so far, the community has been ignored while selecting the VC. That is why we have raised the demand and will also send a letter to the chief minister, requesting her intervention,” he said.

The representatives also said that if their demand was not met, they would launch a movement in due course.

“We will wait for some time. If the state government doesn’t make any decision by then, we will jointly launch a movement on the issue,” Partha Barman added.

The demand, raised when less than a year is left for the Assembly polls, can have electoral ripples. In Cooch Behar, Rajbanshis decide the results of the Assembly seats. In 2021, Trinamool won two of nine Assembly seats in Cooch Behar while the BJP had won the remaining seven. Later, Trinamool bagged the Dinhata seat in a bypoll.