Why IISc Bengaluru Students Led Three-day Protest Over Security Guard’s Death

Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru was on halt for three days from July 1-3 when hundreds of students protested over the death of a young security guard as a newly installed sliding gate in the campus collapsed on him. The students are currently collecting funds to help the family of the deceased, while the institute promised a compensation of Rs 10 lakh. 

On June 30, 23-year-old Gowtham Biswal, working as a security guard at IISc, died after a sliding metal gate weighing about 1,500 kg fell on him. The incident enraged students as they were aware that the gate was ‘faulty’. “It is an obvious case of negligence. Despite several complaints on the faulty condition of gate by several students and security guards, Arun Sharma’s office didn’t take and prompt action,” a research scholar told NewsClick on the condition of anonymity. The gate was built less than two months ago.

The students called off the protest on Wednesday late evening after the IISc Director Anurag Kumar suspended the institute’s Project Engineer cum-Estate-officer Col. Arun Sharma over negligence and assured them that an internal probe into the matter will be done within two weeks. The director also promised that he would share the detailed report of the investigation with students. However, the director refused to include student representative in the probe committee against student’s demand.  

The director’s action was prompted by student’s relentless protests through demonstrations for three continuous days who mobilised in hundreds raising slogans ‘Justice for Biswal’.

In response to the students’ complaints, Bengaluru’s Sadashivanagar police have registered a case under Section 304A (death due to negligence) of the Indian Penal Code against the engineer and contractor (responsible for the construction of gate). One complaint against security in-charge Ramulu was also filed for alleged threatening of his subordinates against unionising over the death. 

The students also alleged that their safety is under threat as the contractor in question has taken up several projects within the campus. 

“Few months ago, one part of a building under-construction inside IISc also collapsed,” the student quoted above told NewsClick. 

Infrastructural ‘holes’ in the country’s premier research institute

In the protest, students have also raised concerns over unregulated construction on campus and safety conditions.

“During rain, the water leaks in the main electric switch outside our rooms in the boys’ hostel. Also, many false ceilings in our bathrooms are broken and hanging from the roof,” Bangalore Mirror quoted a student as saying. There are complaints regarding the closed emergency exists in hostel buildings. 

In December 2018, one research scholar was killed and two others injured in an accident at the  institute’s Aerospace Engineering Department’s Laboratory for Hypersonic where a cylinder blasted.