The Delhi High Court on Friday directed the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) to take back three students,one of them an epileptic,evicted from one of its hostels after midnight.
Justice S Ravindra Bhatt expressed anguish over the action taken of varsity officials who hurriedly threw out the three students at 1 am on the ground that a disciplinary inquiry was pending against them for unruly conduct. How can you pass such an order against the students? Where will they go? asked Justice S Bhatt. The court directed the university to complete the inquiry within a week.
The order (of the warden) should not be given effect till the inquiry is complete. The students are entitled to stay in the hostel, the court said.
The three students Santosh Kumar Pathak,Austosh Singh and Shashi Shankar Singh alleged that the senior wardens order to vacate the hostel was illegal. The order came after a scuffle which had erupted in the hostel at night. The counsel for the students,advocate Monica Arora,submitted that the scuffle took place on March 17 at a meeting held to discuss a North Indian food festival.