GUWAHATI: Fearing for their lives, over 100 students of National Institute of Technology-Nagaland are readying to leave the campus.
The fear was triggered by some recent clashes between local and non-local students. The NIT-Nagaland authorities placed under suspension some ten students but the non-local students are not amused. They have threatened to leave en bloc if “central security force” was not deployed to the campus.
“There has been a rift between local and non-local students for a long time. Three fights between both sides had taken place in this semester itself with the latest being on Friday last. They (some local students) got drunk and abused the non-local students. They abuse and threaten us by saying they are locals. We are now facing a threat to our lives,” a student of the institute, who hails from outside the Northeast, told TNIE requesting anonymity.
He said the students would leave if central security personnel were not deployed to the campus.
“The security personnel that were deployed on the campus did nothing to prevent the fights. As the clashes broke out, they kept watching, making videos with their mobile phones,” he alleged.
NIT-Nagaland director Dr. S Venugopal said a “small fight” had taken place between two groups of first year students and later, following the receipt of a report of the disciplinary committee, some ten students were “punished”.
Talking about the latest fight, he said, “There was a function on Friday and they argued who will take the charge. It eventually led to a fight. We immediately solved it. Based on disciplinary committee report, we gave punishment to around ten students”.
Venugopal said so far no student had left the campus and the students were staging a protest demanding the deployment of personnel of a central security force. It takes time to deploy central force as the matter has to go through various ministries and departments but they want it immediately, he said.
“We are asking the (non-local) students not to leave. We have deputed our staff members, including faculties, on each floor of the hostels to make sure the students are safe. They are giving duty even at night. The situation is under control,” Venugopal added.
NIT-Nagaland registrar Binod Doley claimed the issue had been resolved and there were no problems. The institute has some 600 students. Roughly around 50 per cent of them are non-locals.