Chennai: The governing board of Rukmini Devi College for Fine Arts, Kalakshetra Foundation, suspended an assistant professor and dismissed three contractual staffers Tuesday following intervention at various levels in connection with allegations of rampant sexual harassment on campus.
Action against the accused came on the heels of an unprecedented students’ protest on campus, and a week after the institution’s chairperson dismissed allegations of sexual harassment against staffers as “rumours” intended to malign the reputation of Kalakshetra.
While assistant professor Hari Padman — who was arrested a day earlier on the basis of a complaint by a student from Kerala — has been suspended with immediate effect, three contractual staffers facing similar allegations, namely Sai Krishnan, Sanjith Lal and Sreenath have been dismissed.
ThePrint reported on 21 March about the allegations of sexual harassment on campus.
In a press statement issued Tuesday, the institute’s governing board also said that it has constituted an independent inquiry committee to look into complaints of sexual harassment.
The committee will comprise Justice K. Kannan (Retd), former Tamil Nadu director general of police (DGP) Letika Saran, and renowned anaesthesiologist Dr Shobha Varthaman. The governing board has urged students to appear for their examinations.
A decision has been made to reconstitute the institution’s internal complaints committee, appoint a new student counsellor, the statement added. On Tuesday, advocate B.S. Ajeetha in a letter to the director of Kalakshetra resigned as an external member of the internal complaints committee.
Though P.T. Narendran, a member of the governing board, had told ThePrint Monday that the board “intends to meet all of the students’ demands”, the statement issued by the board did not acknowledge the demand for a students’ union comprising Kalakshetra students to be recognised as an official body working for their welfare on campus.
This was one of the four demands presented by students who held a demonstration on campus Thursday to protest against purported inaction over the allegations of sexual harassment.
Following her visit to the campus Friday, Tamil Nadu State Women’s Commission chairperson A.S. Kumari had said that students told her “stories of the kind of sexual, mental and verbal harassment they face”.
In a report it submitted to the chief secretary Monday, the state women’s panel said it received complaints pertaining to at least one instance of a teacher taking off “his veshti (dhoti) in class while asking girl students to close their eyes”. One student alleged that Hari Padman “made her life very difficult” at Kalakshetra after she turned down his offer to visit him at his residence, while other students said their private parts were groped.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)