Students fight for Presidency walls

Chennai: It is not only political parties which fight to reserve walls for their party propaganda. Students in the 175-year-old Presidency College also do it. Anyone visiting the college, which reopened on Monday after over two weeks’ closure, will be surprised to see the college walls painted with different bus routes and the names of students who travel on it.

The college which has produced two Nobel laureates  Sir C.V. Raman and Chandrasekhar Subrahmanyan - in the past, today faces a dismal future as students look to private colleges for better education.The college has 4,500 undergraduate, postgraduate and research scholars on campus. Faculty say that the quality of students admitted in the past was much better than the ones admitted now, and this reflects the campus culture.

“We need to have a better mechanism to admit students, not through the current counselling process but conduct entrance examinations so that we can select deserving students who will study well and do research. But, as we are bound by government rules, we are not able to admit students in the way private colleges can,” said a teacher.The deterioration in quality can also be seen on the walls with students painting their bus route numbers and the names of students who travel on these routes.

When this correspondent spoke to the students who have painted their bus routes on the wall, they say that this is to show the dominance of their bus route in the college.“We have students who come to college from other areas; so we want to show our strength to these students. We paint our route number and the names of students who come by it,” Suresh, a student who travels in 6D from Tondiarpet, said. Pointing out that the bus route culture has been in existence for over two decades, Muthu, a student who comes in 57F to college, says that the dominance of the bus route helps them to secure a position in the college council.

“We make sure that all our route friends win the elections. These walls are helpful for us during the elections as we need to search for a separate space to paint our campaign material,” he said.College authorities, too, on their part, have instructed students to restrain from violence and wall culture, but the order does not seem to go down well among students. Prof T. Paramananda Perumal, principal of the college, said they had taken note of the issues and the state government has sanctioned funds for renovation of the college infrastructure, including the 175-year-old Victoria hostel complex.

“The recent clash among students was an outcome of the bus route culture. Now, police personnel and our faculty are monitoring students to avoid any incident on campus,” he said, adding that the college will soon get a new building to house 24 new classrooms as part of the 175th year celebrations.