Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan on March 2 suspended the Vice-Chancellor of the Kerala Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (KVASU) at Pookode in Wayanad, M.R. Saseendranath, on the charge of oversight and dereliction of duty that allegedly resulted in the torture, public trial, social shaming, and subsequent death by suicide of J.S. Siddharth, a second-year student, at the campus hostel recently.
Speaking to reporters in Thiruvananthapuram, Mr. Khan said he had requested the Kerala High Court to spare a serving judicial officer for conducting an enquiry into the “gruesome and fatal” incident allegedly perpetrated by Students’ Federation of India (SFI) activists in the college.
Mr. Khan said the SFI and the proscribed Popular Front of India (PFI) activists were acting in tandem on college campuses across Kerala. He said the “torment, insult, physical assault and forced starvation” that resulted in Siddharth’s death were not a one-off incident. The SFI has a stranglehold on campuses and hostels, he said.
