The Manipur University campus at Canchipur in Imphal witnessed violence on Tuesday night after an order to vacate hostels by Wednesday evening. Armed policemen and paramilitary personnel are deployed outside the MU campus to maintain law and order.
A late night order asked students staying in hostels to vacate within 4 p.m. on Wednesday. Inflamed by the order, a group of students vandalised rooms of the wardens of three boys’ hostels. They also set beds and several other items from hostel rooms on fire to prevent police and officials from entering the campus.
The agitated students also closed down the university campus from 10 p.m. on Tuesday. The gates of three girls’ hostels were locked up.
Trouble has been brewing in the university for some days over the implementation of the Central Educational Institution (Reservation in Admission) Amendment Act, 2012 from the current academic session. Scheduled Caste students have been objecting to this Act while the Manipur University Tribal Students’ Union supported it. Though it was widely felt that this polarisation may trigger clashes among the students the MU authorities apparently did not take up any preventive measures, university sources said. However, university officials who do not want to be named said, the order to vacate was a precautionary measure. The admission test based on the new Act will be held on August 12, 2014.
Under the Act, reservation for Scheduled Caste students will come down to 2 per cent from the current 15 per cent whereas that of Scheduled Tribes students will go up to 31 per cent from 7.5 per cent. Reservation for the OBC category too will be reduced from 27 per cent to 17 per cent.
Groups who oppose the Act said it could not be implemented as the predominant population group of the State, the Meiteis are non-tribal.
Though instructions to implement the new Act were sent on September 28, 2012, university authorities has not been acting on it so long, sources said.
