The Students of JNU demur in the form of protest outside All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) throughout JNU convocation, toward fee hike in New Delhi on Monday. The UNION HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal was confined inside the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) campus for about three hours Monday after the main gate was charged by JNU students opposing a hike in hostel fee. Pokhriyal had been called as a guest of honor to JNU’s third convocation ceremony.

Affirming that the Vice-Chancellor had declined to meet them, the students, accompanied by the JNU Students’ Union, cultivated the slogan: ‘No convocation without affordable education.’

The central point of protest is the initiation of service charges — for resources, mess workers, cook, and sanitation — which were so far not covered in the hostel fee. Following the new hostel charges, students ought to pay an estimated service charge of Rs 1,700 per month. The Rent for a single room has been raised from Rs 20 per month to Rs 600 per month, and for a double-sharing room from Rs 10 per month to Rs 300 per month respectively. Students will also have to pay convenience charges, which they did not have been charged so far. The JNU Executive Council is deemed to give the final nod to the new hostel charges on November 13.

Throughout the course of the protest outside the venue, which occurred shortly before noon, police too tried several tricks to move students aside from the gate, which included the use of a water cannon which was used around 1:30 pm.

As 500 students gathered at the West Gate of the university campus, nearest to AICTE, in the morning, they discovered that the gate was obstructed. The statement was made about five layers of obstacles, and the re-routing which laid to moving towards the main North gate. The barricading there was light as compared — they had either just began putting them up or had kept it light to deduct some movement. We tore through that and marched towards the venue,” confirmed Paro Tomar, a Master’s student.

Take a look at JNU Protest Live.