THIRUVANANTHAPURAM / KOZHIKODE: On a day when the CPM state leadership held talks with the Law Academy management to end the 20-day-old agitation, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan trained guns on the self-financing colleges who consider educational institutions as business centres.
While talking tough about self-financing colleges, the chief minister remained tight-lipped about the ongoing student agitation at the Kerala Law Academy.
“The names of some colleges scare students. The government is concerned about their plight,” he said while inaugurating the ‘Smart Classroom Project’ at Nanminda Higher Secondary School in Kozhikode on Sunday. “What we hear from a college that has borrowed the name of Jawaharlal Nehru is really shocking. Likewise, students tremble when they hear about ‘Toms’,” said Pinarayi.
He said a meeting of vice-chancellors will be convened next week to discuss the issue of self-finance colleges. But an attempt by the CPM leadership to find an amicable solution to the students’ agitation at the Kerala Law Academy failed to yield any result, as the college management stuck to its stand that Lekshmi Nair will not step down from the post of principal.
Though party state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan met Law Academy director and Lekshmi Nair’s father N Narayanan Nair, his brother and CPM state committee member Koliyakode Krishnan Nair and director board member Nagarajan at AKG Centre on Sunday, the initiative failed to break the impasse.
It is learnt Narayanan Nair said the proposal to remove Lekshmi Nair was unacceptable. The party pointed out it would be difficult for Lekshmi Nair to function as principal as Kerala University had debarred her from examination-related duties for the next five years.
But Narayanan Nair maintained that the issue was blown out of proportion by vested interests. He said the board would look for legal options if the uncertainty persists.
The college director board met later and unanimously decided that there was no need for the principal to step down.