Nearly four months after the tragic stampede at its open-air auditorium that resulted in the death of four persons including three students, the authorities at the Cochin University of Science and Technology (Cusat) are yet to fix the accountability for the lapses that led to the incident.
The shocking incident occurred just before the start of a music performance by a Bollywood singer as part of the ‘Dhishna’ techno-fest organised by the School of Engineering (SoE) on November 25. A sudden crowd surge created a panic situation leading to the tragedy. A Syndicate panel that probed the lapses in the conduct of the event had submitted a report with its recommendations on December 23.
Senior varsity officials cited the case pending before the Kerala High Court on a plea by Aloshius Xavier, State president of the Kerala Students Union, demanding a judicial inquiry into the incident for the delay in initiating action against those responsible for the tragedy. They recalled an oral observation made by Justice Devan Ramachandran that the young people involved in organising the event must not be subjected to a blame game. “We did not wanted to invite the criticism of the court by taking action against those responsible while the case was pending before it,” they said.
The Syndicate panel was also in a fix over the final recommendations following the observations made by the court. It stayed away from recommending action, but listed out the lapses on the part of the organising committee and the university administration in its report. The panel stated that the organising committee failed to assess the magnitude of the event. It had also blamed the office of the Registrar for not forwarding the request by the Principal of SoE seeking police deployment at the venue to the Kalamassery police station.
