Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Wednesday yet again said that it was not inclined to interfere in the decision of Osmania University vice-chancellor in not allowing the interactive session of Rahul Gandhi in the campus. The VC had on April 30 rejected an application seeking permission to conduct a face to face interaction of Rahul Gandhi with students and unemployed youth at Tagore stadium on May 7.
NSUI members, headed by K. Manavatha Roy, filed an urgent petition before the vacation bench of the High Court urging that they set aside the VC’s decision and to direct him to accord permission.
Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy heard the matter on Wednesday and dismissed the plea of NSUI.
Counsel for NSUI members, Karunakar Reddy, argued that rejection of the petitioner’s application was illegal and biased as the VC had mentioned flimsy grounds to defend his order. He wondered how a VC, who insisted that no political programmes shall not be allowed in the university premises had allowed a political programmes organised by TRS students wing on February 17 in which the mayor and MLAs had participated. The counsel said that the BJP had conducted a mock Assembly in the campus, which is purely political in nature.
The VC had also mentioned that the MBA exams were on and elections to the university employees union and Osmania technical staff union are to be held.The counsel argued that the venue of the interaction was more than two kms away.
Counsel for Osmania University argued that it would create law and order problems as politically-inclined people would also come to the venue. Most of the said NSUI members were not regular scholars and are politically involved. He said if the organisers so desire, they can arrange the programmes outside the campus.
In the opinion of this court, university campuses cannot be used as political platforms. Though the petitioners have stated that earlier certain political events were conducted, merely because of that this court cannot permit the proposed meeting in violation of its executive council resolution.
