contingent of police team and Gangtok East District Police Superintendent Manoj Tiwari came and started battering our students”, a 2nd year student of the college said. Fuelled by the police lathicharge, the students also retaliated by throwing stones. The agitated students then organized a rally and road blockade against the police highhandedness for 3 days.

They were demanding the suspension of East District Police Superintendent Manoj Tiwari and rollback of the fees. Having seen the agitation of the students, the state government immediately rolled back the fees and set up a one man enquiry committee headed by C.T.Wangdi, the Secretary of Land and Revenue Department, to punish the guilty police personnel. Not only this, the state government transferred the east district police chief from the city under pressure from the student. However, the students are still not satisfied with the action of the state government and demanding the immediate suspension of the district police chief. The student agitation continued for 3 days in the capital leaving more than 35 vehicles burnt and injuring more than a dozen students and police personnel.

The student agitation was continued for 3 days in the capital leaving more than 35 vehicles burnt and injuring more than a dozen of students and police personnel.

The unrest in this Himalayan state has affected tourism also. A tourist from Kolkata was surprised having seen the agitation in the hill station first time. He said he regularly came to Gangtok on vacation but this time he tasted the place differently. “ I used to say to my friends that Sikkim is a very peaceful and strike free State. This time when I came to the state, I found the opposite. This is not good for a tourist destination like Sikkim”, Mr. Rajiv Chakrawarti said.

The police lathi charge has been criticized by all walks of life in the state. “This is a shame that our own brothers are hitting in an inhumane manner and for what raising injustice on them. The police who lathicharged our students have to be suspended and there has to be an independent inquiry into the matter” shared a Tadong resident who witnessed the lathicharge. “Four armed IRBs inhumanely battered a student in uniform. What law is this? we will come out on road and will protest. This is no more the issue of mere students, it’s now the issue of the public as well because they are our brothers, sisters, sons and daughters” added another resident from Tadong who confronted the Police after a college boy was beaten mercilessly by the IRB personnel.

The 10 opposition MLAs of Sikkim Krantikari Morcha(SKM) have also condemned the incident and demanded inquiry into the incident. The MLAs also met the Governor Sriniwas Dadashaheb Patil and submitted a memorandum against the incident. Tadong MLA Timothy William Basnet said, “The demand of the students is justifiable. There is four fold hike in student fees. They were just demanding the rollback of fees, but without any provocation, all of a sudden police lathi charged them. It is a high handedness of police,” he said.

Regarding the fee hike the HRDD has clarified that “The semester fees have been revised after thirty years and otherwise we have been charging minimal fees. However the process of hiking fees was going on since last few years and after government approved it recently the fees were hiked as per the discussion with the Principal of different government colleges” said Deepa Basnet, Director, Higher Education during the meeting with the students. “There should have been timely revision in the fees; however we have decided to raise the fees considering the fund constraint being faced by the Colleges. Though Government has been granting fund to the colleges it’s not enough for the facilities that students require” Basnet had added.

Anoop Rai