Chennai: Ex-student held for ransacking government music varsity VC office

Chennai: The city police arrested a former student of Tamil Nadu Music and Fine Arts University in connection with the recent ransacking of the office of the Vice-Chancellor Veena E. Gayathri besides threatening to kill her.

The youth was identified as R. Barani Kumar, (25) of Vyasarpadi, an alumnus of the university, who pursued his bachelor’s degree in thavil. Barani was reportedly suspended due to alleged irregularities, including insufficient attendance.

He completed his graduation in thavil in 2013. He enrolled himself for morsing course in 2014. Since he turned out to be a trouble-maker, he was taken off the rolls. His mother was denied permission to run a canteen. He also highlighted the lack of cleanliness on the university campus on his FB page and was pulled up by the university VC.

The convocation for Barani’s batch was conducted last year and he was not invited. His friend Vigneshwar too was ignored for the function. They had not received their certificates yet. It was also learnt that Barani’s mother was running a refreshment stall inside the campus without obtaining any permission from authorities. The campus already has a canteen. The stall was evicted from the campus.

The arrested is said to have confessed to breaking into the room under the cover of darkness on July 24 and going on rampage. He left two notes — one written in a chart paper in Gayathri’s room and the other on the unprinted side of a film poster and left in the general administration room.

He had damaged the WiFi router installed in Gayathri’s room and damaged the steel locker, besides strewing files. He also scraped off the image of Gayathri in a portrait photo in which she was seen posing with Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa.