BHUBANESWAR: Three officials and two security guards of Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology (KIIT) were arrested on Tuesday on charges of assaulting Nepalese students during their protest on the campus over a 20-year-old girl from Nepal being allegedly driven to suicide by a BTech batchmate, reports Debabrata Mohapatra.
The arrests coincided with Odisha govt instituting a three-member inquiry committee as the row triggered by the third-year student’s death on Sunday resonated in the assembly.
Among the panel members is the home department’s additional chief secretary Satyabrata Sahu.
BJD raises issue in assembly, ties it to ‘Odisha lawlessness’
Among the panel members is home department’s additional chief secretary Satyabrata Sahu. Women and child development secretary Shubha Sarma and higher education secretary Aravind Agrawal are the other two members of the inquiry committee.
“Reports of misconduct, including the use of force against students by private individuals, are being investigated, and those responsible shall be held accountable per the law,” the state govt said.
KIIT suspended three other officials and dismissed the two arrested security guards while issuing an apology for their alleged misconduct.
“We are extremely appalled by the untoward incident that took place on our campus on the evening of Feb 16. We are also regretful of the way some of us behaved with the agitating students. We love our students and have never done any disservice to them,” the deemed-to-be university said.
The student accused of harassment was arrested on Monday, based on a complaint by a cousin of the deceased.
The commotion on campus almost snowballed into a diplomatic row, with Nepal’s PM K P Sharma Oli putting out a statement on his Facebook page about students from Nepal being “forcibly evicted” from their hostels. He later posted on X that the Nepal embassy had deputed two officials to stand by the students and requested New Delhi’s intervention. KIIT gave the Nepalese students the option of returning to campus soon after.
In the assembly, BJD MLA Pratap Keshari Deb sought to link what happened at KIIT to the alleged lawlessness in Odisha. Outside the assembly, fellow BJD MLA Goutam Buddha Das said, “Govt failed to handle the sensitive issue, because of which it escalated and Odisha was defamed.”
Congress MLA Tara Prasad Bahinipati called for a judicial investigation and threatened a sit-in on the assembly premises if govt didn’t order one. “We are committed to ensure safety and security of all the students including those from Nepal. In case of any difficulty, the students can approach us 24×7 on 8280338301,” commissioner of police S Dev Datta Singh said.