A call for protest by Left student unions at Jadavpur University in connection with the death of Anis Khan, a former student of Aliah University who was found dead in mysterious circumstances, resulted in a daylong tussle between students and employees loyal to Trinamul.

The Students Federation of India (SFI), a wing of the CPM, and the All India Students’ Association (AISA) had called a strike on the campus to protest the alleged murder of Khan in Howrah’s Amta.

The SFI, which won the election in the arts faculty when the campus polls were held last in 2019, locked gate number 4 and did not allow classes to be held in the faculty.

Trouble began when the protesting students assembled at Aurobindo Bhavan, the administrative headquarters of the university, and locked the main entrance around 12.30pm. The gates at the rear of the building remained open.

As the SFI supporters put up flags of their organisation on the locked collapsible gate, employees erupted in protest and demanded that the gate be unlocked immediately.

Pro-vice-chancellor Samantak Das, whose office is on the ground floor of Aurobindo Bhavan, intervened and tried in vain to pacify both sides.

Amid the sloganeering, JU employees loyal to Trinamul opened a collapsible gate on the left side of the building, which usually remains locked from inside.

The employees also tore a banner put up by the protesting students and that resulted in a scuffle between the two sides.

Four students, Koushiki Bhattacharya, Tisha Bhandari, Shrija and Shanti Dutta, suffered mild injuries in the scuffle and had to be taken to the KPC Medical College and Hospital.

“The Trinamul Congress supporters tried to end our protest forcibly. We did not close the gates at the rear side. Still they picked a fight with the students. Since TMCP (the Trinamul students’ union) does not have any base here, the employees were deployed to coerce students into ending the protest,” said Aushtup Chakroborty, who is pursuing MPhil in international relations at JU and is a member of the SFI in JU.

The protesting students shouted slogans blaming chief minister Mamata Banerjee for Khan’s death. The employees blew horns of vehicles to drown out the slogans.

Pro-VC Das could not continue his dialogue with the students because of the deafening noise.

JU employees carrying Trinamul flags converged on the corridor. Among the employees on the corridor was Binoy Singh, president of the JU unit of the Sara Bangla Trinamul Shiksha Bandhu Sanity.

When a teacher asked Singh why horns were being blown, he replied: “We are doing this because we cannot shout like them because of our age.”

Ritam Majhi, a member of the AISA’s JU unit, said: “During the Hok Kolorob movement in 2014, the Trinamul employees’ union had tried to disrupt the protest by students. They are at it again”.

The Hok Kolorob movement was launched as the then VC had called police to the campus to end a students’ agitation.

“The students cannot lock a university gate in the name of protest,” Singh said.

The students unlocked the gates at 5.20pm, but vowed to continue a sit-in agitation until the university authorities took action against Singh for leading the assault on students.