Apoorva Y.K., a final-year MA student of law at the South Asian University (SAU), was told on Thursday that the university would not revoke her expulsion from the institution for taking part in a protest.

The student has been on dharna for six days outside the university campus in the Maidan Garhi area to demand the right to protest and the revocation of punishment.

“The university does not allow a semblance of protest. It has taken extremely harsh actions against students for merely demanding a raise in stipend and scholarship,” Apoorva said at a media conference here.

The international university was set up with India covering the capital investment and half of the operational costs, with the other half shared by the other seven Saarc nations. It offers Master’s and PhD courses to students of these nations. The university now has around 300 students.

Students have been protesting since October 2020 to seek an increase in the stipend for Master’s students from Rs 5,000 to Rs 7,000 a month and the support for PhD students from Rs 25,000 to Rs 31,500 a month, on a par with the Junior Research Fellowship (JRF). The students were also asking for representation in the forums to deal with sexual harassment. However, the university rejected all these demands.

Following the protests, the university expelled two students, rusticated two others and suspended one Bangladeshi student on November 3, 2022. Ammar Ahmad, an MA student who was rusticated, developed a psychiatric disorder and suffered a cardiac arrest.

On November 27, the university reduced the penalty to a one-week suspension for four students and a Rs 500 fine for the Bangladeshi student.

However, students demanded that the university must bear the medical expenses of Ammar. The institution showcaused five more students.

Of those five students, Apoorva and Prochetha M, an MPhil student, were expelled. Keshav Sawarn, an MA student, and Kumar Rohith, a PhD student, were rusticated for a year and Bona Chakraborty, a Bangladeshi national, was fined Rs 500 and has been debarred for any future programme in SAU.

Their request for revocation of the penalty has been rejected by the university. Apoorva was to complete her course in the next three months.

Ammar’s elder brother Izan Ahmad said that the university has provided Rs 4 lakh out of Rs 12 lakh already spent for the treatment of Ammar.

An email has been sent to the acting president of SAU, Prof Ranjan Kumar Mohanty, to understand his perspective on the demands and complaints about disallowing any form of dissent on the campus. His response is awaited.