A group of men and women in camouflage gear like military personnel entered Jadavpur University on Wednesday afternoon and positioned themselves outside its administrative headquarters.
They claimed to be from the Indian Army initially and some of their uniforms carried the army insignia. Some of them also spoke of their links with the “National Human Rights Commission”.
The officiating vice-chancellor appeared to see nothing wrong in their presence. “The National Human Rights Commission has sent this team. They must have realised.... There is the law of the land, be it of the state or the country. They must have done it on the basis of this (law of the land). The university is not outside the ambit of the law of the land. Let me see what this is all about,” Buddhadeb Sau said while entering his office.
The group wore red berets and their shoulder lapels carried the abbreviation WHRPF, which a man who identified himself as their “group captain” described as World Human Rights Peace Force.
A letterhead they carried had “Asian Human Rights Society” printed on it.
As word spread about an alleged army siege of JU and questions swirled around about who these uniformed people actually were, an army spokesperson clarified to The Telegraph that they had no such unit. A spokesperson for the army’s Eastern Command said: “They have nothing to do with the Indian Army.”
The intruders then said they wanted to volunteer to “combat unrest” on the campus following the death of a first-year undergraduate student on August 10.
As a representative of the group went to meet the officiating VC, the members stood guard under the
portico of Aurobindo Bhavan, the administrative headquarters of the university.
A section of students protested and many wondered how a group in army-like fatigues could enter a campus where police do not enter without explicit instructions from the VC.
Nikhil Mandal, the “group captain”, said: “We have decided to come on our own so peace could be restored on the campus. We are based at Champahati in South 24-Parganas. We are a force with 120-odd personnel. About 20 personnel have come to Jadavpur.”
Sau’s response to the group’s presence made many suspicious. Sau, leader of a pro-BJP teachers’ wing who has been handpicked by the governor to steer JU through a period of turmoil, said: “We want to increase human surveillance on the campus. If the university gets security service free of cost, there should not be any problem.”
Sau, who later held a meeting with a representative of the outfit in his chamber, said: “They are an NGO that wants to provide security to the university for free. They want us to let them stay overnight on the campus and provide them food. We have sought a proposal from them. The university authorities will review their credentials and decide on hiring them.”
A JU official close to the VC said they had initially thought the Bengal governor had sent them special security.
“On Tuesday evening, a group of students came to meet the officiating VC. They apparently misbehaved with him, following which he informed the governor, who is the chancellor of the university. We thought the chancellor had sent the force,” he said.
Calls, a text message and an email from this newspaper to the chancellor’s office failed to elicit a response.
According to a JU official, “the force left the campus at 3.30pm”, after an hour’s stay.
The police said the group were taken to Jadavpur police station once they stepped out. “We are checking the credentials of the organisation and the people who are claiming to head it. As a very sensitive probe is underway at Jadavpur University, we are verifying all the details of these people and from where they came,” said a senior officer at Lalbazar.
The Telegraph tried to call all the phone numbers mentioned on the letterhead of the organisation. But all were switched off.
A student leader from the engineering and technology stream at JU said: “While we want a fair probe into the death of the student and condemn ragging, efforts are underway to engage forces dressed in army camouflage to turn the campus into a surveillance state and kill the democratic space. We know this is a conspiracy of the right-wing forces and will oppose them tooth and nail.”