A number of teachers at IIT Kharagpur gathered on Saturday to protest the institute’s decision to not reopen the Prembazar gate of the campus, which has remained closed since the onset of the Covid pandemic.
The teachers alleged that the closure of the gate, which connects the campus with Prembazar and Hijli Co-operative Society, is causing inconvenience to the employees and their family members who live in those areas.
Karabi Biwas, general secretary of the IIT Kharagpur Teachers’ Association, said faculty and other staff members who live in the Prembazar area face problems commuting between home and office because the closure of the gate forces them to make detours. Such detours cause even more inconvenience during late hours.
The IIT campus has four gates, of which only the Prembazar gate remains closed.
“Not all employees and research scholars stay on the campus. A section of them lives in the Prembazar area. After the Covid restrictions were eased last year, the three other gates were reopened. But for some inexplicable reasons, the Prembazar gate is yet to be reopened,” said Biswas.
“In the post-Covid period, when all other facilities and businesses have opened up, it is high time the Prembazar gate was reopened, too.”
A senior official at the IIT said the gate has not been reopened because of security issues. He, however, did not elaborate on those issues.
Calls and text messages from this newspaper to the IIT Kharagpur director, V.K. Tewari, and registrar Tamal Nath failed to elicit any response.
An IIT professor who was present in Saturday’s protest said they were also concerned about the plight of the domestic help, gardeners and daily wage earners hired by IIT employees staying on the campus.
“They, too, are encountering difficulties while entering and exiting the campus. They come on foot or riding cycles. As the gate remains closed, they have to make detours under this scorching sun,” the teacher said.
Sources on the campus said this was the first protest by teachers since the IIT authorities issued an order in June 2020 saying, among other things, “no employee shall in any radio broadcast or in any document published anonymously in his own name or in the name of any other person or in any communication to the press or in public utterance, make any statement of fact or opinion which has the effect of any adverse criticism of any current policy or action of the institute”.
Biswas, general secretary of the teachers’ association, said past communications with the IIT authorities on the reopening of the Prembazar gate did not yield any results.
“This gathering has been organised to show displeasure of the campus community on the authorities’ decision and to raise a just demand for the reopening of the gate at least for pedestrians and cyclists,” Biswas told The Telegraph.