More than 200 students from the physics, chemistry, botany, zoology and environmental science department protested outside the Viceregal Lodge, the VC’s office, for close to five hours.
DU science students hold protests against lab charges, demand withdrawal of payment orders
Several students from the science department of Delhi University protested in front of the Vice-Chancellor's office against the new rule to pay for the instruments and materials they use at the laboratories, specifically the University Science Instrumentation Centre (USIC).
More than 200 students from the physics, chemistry, botany, zoology and environmental science department protested outside the Viceregal Lodge, the VC’s office, for close to five hours.
Delhi University had earlier announced that from May 1 onwards, the students will have to pay a certain fee every time they use the instruments at the lab for the research work. Until now, students will use the instruments in the course of their studies for free. Students have been demanding that the new charges should be removed, but the DU administration hasn't responded to their demands, as reported by TOI.
On Tuesday, students held a protest march from their departments raising slogans against USIC, which has notified the new charges. USIC was established in 1984 and is run with the support of the University Grants Commission and an Indo-Japanese grant-in-aid.
As per the new notification, students will have to pay different charges for different things used in the lab. The charges start from INR 20 per litre for liquid nitrogen and INR 100 per hour for using the circular dichroism spectroscopy and then goes up to inr 2,000 for single-crystal XRD per sample. USIC has listed the rates for 21 instruments on its premises. After the use of these became payable, students on average have to pay Rs 300-400 per day to pursue their studies.
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