Letter to agitating students from IIT Kharagpur director: Let's engage democratically
Dear students,
Some of you have been agitating regarding the revised Mess Overhead charges that are applicable from the next semester. The new mess overhead structure — which has seen a sudden increase in the charges from Rs 8,250 to Rs 15,800 — was developed by the Hall Management Centre (HMC) in consultation with the student representatives over a period of time and not in any unilateral manner.
The last time the overhead charges were revised was in 2011. Over this period, there has been significant cost escalation that was being met by the institute. This institute support was to the tune of an average of Rs 7.5 crore per year in various forms.
In addition, the institute had funded a reasonably large corpus fund for meeting hostel-related exigencies.
As with every other recurring expense, there was an urgent need for revision in the Mess Overhead charges. The new scheme drew all the manpower from contracted messes to bring everyone on to the same platform. This was computed by the HMC upon the request of the majority of the students to enable lower mess food bills in contracted messes.
An annual 10 per cent increase in the cost was carried out — starting from Rs 8,250 for six years — and we added the additional manpower cost of the workers of the contracted messes to reach a figure close to the proposed value.
As the new rates ostensibly witnessed a sudden jump, the student representatives, HMC and the Dean, Students' Association, requested the institute's support to reduce this to some extent.
This was brought to my attention since the deputy director is out of the country now.
I was also apprised of certain issues raised by students related to calculation of the 7th pay commission, inclusion of GST, separate claims of residents of the Vikram Sarabhai Residential Complex (VSRC), married scholars, possible reduction in Mess Bill Advance, et al.
Upon looking at the basic calculations, I asked for the details and was in the process of examining them when a group of students took to agitating in haste on December 20 even though the Dean, SA had sent out a message. The unwarranted response only delayed the decision-making process and caused great pain and damage to the student and teaching fraternities.
The situation arising out of such an over-reaction was extremely painful for us, including me, as the institute is also my alma mater.
I saw some students employ the choicest of abuse while engaging with the faculty and staff — making uninformed false allegations, blocking entrance gates and confining a large number of people, including women, for long hours denying them even their basic right of going to the toilet, even dirtying the walls of the main building. To say the least, I feel very ashamed as an IITKGPian.
On the other hand, a large number of faculty and staff assembled here refused to engage in force and waited patiently till the students finally dispersed on December 21. While the institute was willing to listen to the students in a peaceful manner, we refrained from engaging in any discussion under duress.
Subsequently, on December 21, a group of three deans along with the vice president of Technology Students’ Gymkhana met some of the agitating students and noted their concerns.
We noticed that many of the issues were already under consideration.
It was not clear to me what necessitated the loss of two days of decision making and why everyone had to suffer this way — giving the media an opportunity to denigrate our institution. I guess that there has been a communication gap as IITKGP students are not known to react this way.
IIT Kharagpur is the last institute to overburden students or discriminate among them. Some of the decisions that we have taken recently after I assumed charge:
We were the first to request the government not to increase the UG fees to Rs 3 lakh, to agree to the new rule of waivers, the first to implement interest subvention, to have increased the MCM limit to Rs 6 lakh, the first to pledge support to the new scholarship scheme of Rs 25,000-28,000 for PhD students and to give out arrears, the first to allow project students to transfer to regular PhD students with stipend after two years and more if project funds are exhausted; the first to allow students of all categories to get some allowance even in the sixth year if needed.
We removed the cap on the number of students going for national and international conferences per year, allowed full funding to students for top international conferences. The list is long.
The measures listed require us to spend money, which is in diminishing supply. But we were committed to reduce spending on other fronts to ensure that our students benefit. We have more plans like facilitation of international research internships, joint degree programmes, et al.
We are trying to see what funds we can gather to help our students achieve excellence and gain the best experience. This will make IITKGP programmes unique.
While we are keen on helping reduce the sudden jump in Mess Overhead charges, we would not like to do it at the cost of some of the other schemes that promote excellence and equity. We are in the process of examining all the issues in sufficient detail to do our best.
All due diligence requires time and we have to adhere to government norms. I therefore request you to be patient till we reach a decision as soon as possible.
Please do not be provoked into creating an atmosphere where the rest of the world — including recruitment agencies, national and international institutions that accept our students — feels IITKGP students are not the type of candidates it wants. Some elements may not have the best interests of students and the institute in mind. We have to be vigilant.
Little did I know that for two days, I would be profusely apologising to the several distinguished alumni (at least five) on campus in the last two days (who are giants in their fields), two major industry leaders who came to initiate unique collaborations — and the National Steering Committee on e-Library Consortium, which I chair nationally to enable large discounts on e-books and journals.
I had to apologise for I could not meet them, because my colleagues and I were held hostage in my office, and they had to leave or cancel the engagements. I tried my best to explain to them that is not the new normal of IITKGP — and that it remains the great institution it was three days ago.
I hope that good sense will prevail and you will get back to the true normal of IITKGP.
We will try to work out a way to take the conversation forward into the future in a democratic manner.
We have to remove the disconnect I observed in a much better way. If you have suggestions, please consolidate them and do share them with us.
Best wishes,
Partha P Chakrabarti
Director, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur