Med team fails to check on Vishva-Bharati VC amid stir; faculty body seeks PM's help to end logjam

A medical team that wanted to check on Visva-Bharati Vice Chancellor Bidyut Chakraborty was apparently turned away by students agitating outside his residence Thursday as their proposal that two of them would accompany the doctors during the health examination was rejected by the academic.

In a late evening development, the West Bengal government dispatched a four-member medical team from the Bolpur Subdivisional Hospital to conduct a health check-up of the VC but his family told the SDPO accompanying the team that the VC is okay now and no immediate check-up is needed.

Chakraborty has not stepped out of home over the past six days in the wake of the agitation being carried out by the students and some teachers over the expulsion of three of their peers.

The second medical team, consisting of two hospital doctors, a nurse and a technologist, waited outside the VC's residence around 9:30 pm as the SDPO, Abhisek Roy, called up his family and said the administration has rushed all assistance if he needs any medical emergency.

''His daughter answered the call and informed that sir is sleeping, and he is okay now. They say no medical check-up is needed,'' Roy told reporters, adding, ''We are returning now. But we will be ready to come back whenever required.'' Earlier in the afternoon, the first medical team sent by the university was stopped by the demonstrators from entering the VC's residence.

A doctor who was a part of this team told reporters that he and other colleagues were asked to examine the VC's health by the Visva-Bharati administration after Chakraborty complained of uneasiness.

The demonstrators, however, stopped the team from visiting him, the doctor said.

A protester, however, claimed that he and other students are ''worried about the VC's health condition'' and wanted to find out how he had been doing.

''We just proposed that two students be allowed to accompany the health team. Since the VC did not allow us to enter his home, we had to turn the team away,'' he stated.

The agitator further said that he wished Chakraborty well, but ''the possibility that he would leave home along with the doctors could not be ruled out''.

Supporting the protesters, Visva-Bharati University Faculty Association (VBUFA) office-bearer Sudipto Bhattacharya sought to know ''what harm would have happened if two young students went there?'' ''If the VC is actually sick, we will do everything necessary for his treatment. But if the VC only communicates with a chosen few and tries to keep the students out of the process, then the suspicion that he may want to escape will definitely arise,'' he added.

The VBUFA has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who happens to be the chancellor of the central university, urging him to save this august institution ''from further degeneration''.

In its letter to Modi, the VBUFA said that ''three students have been rusticated, and a large number of faculty members and employees suspended or issued show-cause notices'' in matters which could have been solved through dialogue and discussions.

The association also said that the events that had been unfolding of late, triggered by the decisions taken by the VC over the past two years, might lead to the ''closure'' of the institution.

''While the honourable chancellor interacts with students of this vast country on a regular basis, professor Chakraborty failed to talk to the students who are like our sons and daughters. Driven by confrontational attitude and lack of vision, professor Chakraborty is leading Visva-Bharati to an existential crisis,'' the VBUFA alleged in its letter to the PM.

The faculty body, representing a section of the teachers, said that most members of the university's statutory bodies, including the executive council, are acting in a partisan manner ''and at the behest of the VC''.

It demanded that an investigation be carried out into the complaints against Chakraborty by an independent committee, headed by a serving or a retired judge of a high-court.

The three students -- two of them pursuing economics and one a student of the music department -- were expelled by the central university for alleged disorderly conduct.

They were first put under suspension in January 2021 for alleged disorderly conduct and use of abusive words against Chakraborty during a protest at Chhatimtala on the university campus.

A Visva Bharati official said the students were given a chance to defend their case before the enquiry commissioner appointed by the university, but they were ''adamant and unapologetic''.

The official also said that the charges levelled against the VC were ''untrue'' and the university authorities only seek to work in unison with all stakeholders to ''improve the multidisciplinary academic standard of the institution'' founded by Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore.