Students of IIIT Srirangam who had forced the closure of their institute for various issues, found out through an RTI, that a whopping sum of Rs 5 crores had been sanctioned for their institute a while ago. Students had ‘struck’ studies so to speak and refused to attend lectures until their demand of a ‘better’ mentor institute was met. They were also irked that they had to use Anna University’s premises.
The RTI application filed by a student of IIIT Srirangam on February 22, 2016, revealed that the Institute was granted an amount of Rs 5 crores until March 4, 2016. On learning about this, the students were even more outraged due to miscommunication by the institute’s management.
One of the pressing demands by the students was a change in the mentorship from Anna University to National Institute of Technology, Trichy. They told PaGaLGuY that the current mentor was not able to provide even basic amenities. “We have been demanding an upgrade in the infrastructural capabilities of the institute and a change in the faculty of the institute, from the past seven months. The management kept saying that there were insufficient funds for the same. And now we realise that the money was always there, there was just lack of will to put them to use.”
When PaGaLGuY spoke to Dr T Senthilkumar, Director of IIIT Srirangam, about the students’ claims, he replied, “We were in the process of upgrading the institute. An application to offer tenders was also sent for constructing a building for the institute. Now if the mentorship changes from Anna University to the other institute, this money will be transferred to the new mentor.”
After heeding into the matter, Ms Tripti Gurha, Director of Technical Colleges (IIIT), has promised to change the mentorship within 10 days, where students can continue with their semester. Meanwhile, though students were asked to vacate the hostels, after the institute was closed, they have been allowed to stay in their respective hostels until a solution to the matter has been established. They, however,