Bengaluru: VTU students move HC against offline semester exams

Bengaluru: Students of the Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU) have moved the Karnataka High Court seeking scrapping of its decision to hold semester exams offline.

Advocate Tanvi Dubey has moved the writ, along with an urgent memo on behalf of the students. In tweet, the advocate said, "Writ filed on behalf of 120 students before Hon'ble High Court of Karnataka seeking to quash notification providing for the conduct of exams in offline mode."

"Imposition of restrictions should be considered keeping in view 3-10 cases of new strain of coronavirus being reported in the State of Karnataka and the university should reconsider its decision to conduct offline exams and adopt alternative modes," she said.

The students have accused several private engineering colleges of lack of transparency. In the absence of a transparent approach, the students have conducted an online survey to find out what the majority of stakeholders want.

"According to this survey which received thousands of

responses, 97.1% of students wanted online exams. This information has also been sent to the university. However, the university has again turned a blind eye to this," the students mention in the letter addressed to the VTU.

"In BMS College of Engineering, one hostel has been sealed off by the hostel secretary Dr. Vardhaman S.M. and over 16 students and 4 mess staffers have tested Covid-19 Positive. Students were forcibly put in sharing rooms in the hostel. Students are being mistreated and no student or parent is given any official information regarding this. This has truly become a very horrifying

experience that students are having to face and every student and parents are living with fear for their life every day. The BMS College of Engineering management and VTU are doing their level best to hide all these facts," the letter said. A girl named Jayshree (named changed) from M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology tested positive for coronavirus and none of her friends has been tested yet and are being made to attend classes regularly.

Last week, at Ramaiah the students have erupted in protest. The college authorities, however, cited the VTU guidelines for taking a decision in favour of holding the examinations in an offline mode.