SRINAGAR: Scores of students at the Kashmir University’s Law department were left to shiver in the chilling cold inside their examination centres on Wednesday by the varsity administration, which according to the students has failed to setup adequate heating arrangements.
The 8th semester students pursuing BA LLB at the department, who wrote their ‘Cyber Law’ paper on Wednesday, told Kashmir Reader they could hardly write their answer scripts as their hands became numb in the face of “inadequate” heating arrangement inside the exam centres amid bone chilling cold prevalent in Kashmir since the recent heavy snowfall.
The KU varsity administration, they alleged, had even kept “empty” gas cylinders inside one of the centres as a result of which the students were left at the mercy of the chilling weather.
“The first gas cylinder inside the room was only for showcasing and did not work. Although another cylinder was brought in, but it disappeared minutes later,” an aggrieved student said.
Another student said that the staff at one of the examination centres asked them to warm themselves with the lone gas heater kept at the front.
“How were we supposed to do that? Were we supposed to write papers or rush to the heater within the limited time?” a student asked.
The aggrieved students complained that the “inadequate” gas heaters turned out to be insufficient inside the extra-large examination halls thus making it even more challenging to write papers.
They further alleged that the poor heating arrangements were despite the varsity administration had hiked examination fee this year.
“The examination fee was around Rs 1100 last year, but they hiked it to around 1600 including heating charges. Still, the arrangements were nowhere,” a student alleged.
Registrar KU, Prof Nisar A Mir said the process to tender out the burning of gas as well as traditional heaters on immediate basis was on.
Prof Mir said the heating arrangements at the examination centres had turned out to be insufficient in wake of the early snowfall recently.
To make things worse, the power transmission line inside the KU campus, he said, had been severely damaged.

Irshad Khan