Lucknow University to reopen on July 10

The Lucknow University will reopen on July 10 as the Allahabad High Court pulled up the police for not acting swiftly, according to its website.

The university was closed till further orders after some expelled students, holding a protest on the campus over the alleged denial of admission, assaulted about a dozen teachers on Wednesday.

The university, in its website, displayed the new counselling schedule for admissions on Friday.

The stalled admission process and the classes will now begin again on Tuesday, and the time tables uploaded on the site before that day.

Earlier in the day, the Allahabad High Court criticized Uttar Pradesh Police for not responding promptly to the complaint by the university authorities on vandalism on the campus.

The court had taken suo motu cognizance of the violence and issued summons to them on Thursday.

The bench of justices Vikram Nath and Rajesh Singh directed the police to file an affidavit on the action taken by them.

The matter will be heard next on July 16.

The teachers’ union had on Friday demanded the transfer of Lucknow Senior Superintendent of Police Deepak Kumar within the next 24 hours and said they wanted a full-fledged police station to be set up on the campus.

UP police chief O P Singh on Thursday had handed over the probe into the violence to Lucknow Range IGP, transferred a police officer and suspended the outpost in-charge.

Questioning the role of the local police, the bench had on Thursday said, “It is unfortunate and extremely painful that students have the courage, audacity and boldness to enter the premises from where they have been expelled and create physical violence and attack the vice chancellor, teachers and staff of the university.”

Police were informed about the likelihood of the expelled students creating a ruckus. But they did not take appropriate measures, the bench had said quoting newspaper reports.

The protesters had alleged they were denied admission to postgraduate courses because they had taken part in an agitation against Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath in 2017.

Opposing the CM’s visit to the campus, the protesters had had allegedly obstructed Adityanath’s convoy in June 2017 and waved black flags.

(With inputs from PTI)