BENGALURU: The Bangalore University has issued an official notice to “illegal occupants” of its hostels at Jnana Bharathi campus to vacate the premises immediately.
According to university sources, the notice was issued a few days ago.
“There is no rule that says that the university should issue notice or circular to them (overstaying students), but on humanitarian grounds we have issued the notice, and it is better if they vacate on their own,” said Vice-Chancellor B Thimme Gowda.
If the occupants refuse to vacate, the authorities have decided to take the help of the police. “We have asked them to vacate immediately. If they resist, we will take the help of the police,” Thimme Gowda added.
BU officials said there are at least 100 illegal occupants in the post-graduate and PhD hostels (both boys and girls). According to officials, illegal inmates are those staying in hostels after completing their course, those who have completed one PG course and enrolled for another and PhD students after the submission of theses.
“Because of illegal inmates, we were unable to provide accommodation to students who are eligible,” Thimme Gowda said.
Even the committee constituted by the then Chancellor H R Bhardwaj, headed by Justice Vasishth (Vasishth Commission) had highlighted the illegal occupancy issue. Following its report, Bhardwaj wrote to the then V-C Prabhu Dev and also to the higher education department to take appropriate action.
In 2009, Prabhu Dev tried to clear the hostels of illegal occupants. In the Operation Hostel campaign, the officials were surprised to find working men and women would go to great lengths to stay in the BU hostels.
At one hostel, the officials found a person posing as a student who was actually a police sub-inspector. There were also students who had been staying for 10 years by getting themselves admitted into one course after the other. The officials had prepared a list of at least 50 students in each of the hostels of the university. That time too the students staged a series of protests against this.
There are 12 hostels in BU, including five in Jnana Bharati campus, a ladies hostel in Jayanagar, one in Central College campus, one at UVCE and two hostels at Kolar.