IIT Kharagpur informs administration about 'law and order violations' by local group

The IIT Kharagpur has reported to the West Midnapore district administration, state government and the Union Ministry of Human Resources Development about 'law and order violations' by a local group and to ensure safety of the students, faculty and staff.

An IIT KGP statement on Sunday said a group called the Joint Action Committee had allegedly prevented 850 contractual workers from clean-up and mess services at the student halls and had manhandled some of the workers on Saturday.

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The group had also called an indefinite strike on Sunday which was later called off, district officials said and promised full cooperation to IIT KGP authorities in maintaining order.

The premier institute has close to 12,000 students living in more than 20 halls of residence and the Hall Management Centre (HMC) has always engaged outsourcing agencies, the statement said.

The group had been claiming that more outsourced workers be engaged in the mess service and cleaning operations at the student halls as in their view the number of staff is inadequate and they wanted to have a say in the operations.

"Supporters of this group are neither on the institutes pay roll nor on outsourced duty and were found illegally entering the halls of residence and coercing the mess workers to leave their work yesterday. They went to the extent of physical assault and threatening them with dire consequences," the statement said quoting an IIT KGP official.

Refusing to give in to the demand of the group, the statement said, "We stand firm on the policies and decisions about not to give in to their illegal threats. The workers concerned are working today."

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Some of the girl students further complained that fewof these local goons entered one of the girls hostels forcibly on Saturday.

"I saw several of these men in bikes and cyclesforcing their way in our hostel while the institutes security personnel were trying to stop them from entering," a girl student said.

IIT KGP said the matter has also been reported to police.

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The institute authorities will have a close monitoring of the situation for the next three days, up to Tuesday night,"as it may take some time to entirely bring back the normalcy," the statement said.