After weeks of protests being organised at Hindu College due to the availability and facilities of the girls hostel, the Delhi Commission for Women has sought UGC’s response.
The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has issued fresh summons to the University Grants Commission (UGC), for the latter failed to respond to the earlier ones, say the members of the DCW. On the issue of the girls’ hostel of Hindu College, the DWC stood alongside the students who were protesting day and night. They sought a reply from the former as to there was a Rs. 30,000 difference in the fees of the girls’ and the boys’ hostel. This move was adopted after the panel had repeatedly written to the UGC seeking answers regarding the discriminatory hostel fee for the University as a whole, but they were not obliged with a response.
Protests have been circumventing the College for the past few days. They started with the students having foundational demands like reduction of fees for the girls’ hostel, similar curfew timings and rules in comparison to the boys’ hostel, the formation of a Student Council for them (like the one that exists in the boys’ Hostel) for facilitating communication between the administration and the students. The umbrella goal for these gatherings was to lobby for a clearly chalked out transparent admission process, where allotment of seats in the hostel would be made according to a cut-off list while maintaining the reserved seats for different categories.
The Commission also complained of many colleges within the University not having hostel for girls, making it even more difficult for them to come to Delhi and receive education. The girls who do come here are forced to live as paying guests in accommodations provided by private individuals who charge them exorbitantly.
The student protestors, apart from demanding equality in terms of rules and fees, also demanded an explanation as to why, after such long 117 years of the existence of the college, the authorities realised that girls also study here and they do need a roof under which they can stay. It is alarming that the realisation of the necessity of accommodation dawned upon them after decades, and yet the provision offered remains unaffordable to more than half of the population of this country.
Feature Image Credits: The Times of India
Ananya Bhardwaj