Kolkata professor forced to quit over ‘objectionable’ photos to move court
The professor was asked to pay ₹99 crore for “causing immense and irreparable damage” to the varsity after a parent complained against her
Kolkata’s St Xavier’s University allegedly forced an assistant professor to quit and asked her to pay ₹99 crore for “causing immense and irreparable damage” to the varsity after a parent complained she uploaded “objectionable” photos on Instagram.
She is now planning to move the Calcutta high court demanding an apology and monetary compensation. “In June 2021, I uploaded four to five photos on Instagram. In two pictures, I was wearing a bikini in my room which I had shared with some select people,” she said. She joined the university as an assistant professor of English two months later in August 2021.
The parent complained he found his son, an undergraduate student, looking at the assistant professor’s picture in which she “posed in a sexually explicit way, causing deliberate public exposure.”
“To look at a teacher dressed in her undergarments uploading pictures on social media is utterly shameful for me as a parent, since I have tried to shield my son from this kind of gross indecency and objectification of the female body. It is obscene, vulgar and improper for an 18-year-old student to see his professor dressed in scanty clothes exhibiting her body on a public platform,” the parent purportedly said in a letter to the university.
HT could not independently verify the authenticity of the letter, which has been shared on social media.
The assistant professor said she appeared before a disciplinary committee in October 2021 where the complaint letter was read out and she was asked to resign citing personal reasons. “I was not issued any show cause notice. Nor I was given any time to respond. They did not even show me the complaint letter...”
Father Felix Raj, the vice-chancellor of the university, did not respond to calls and messages for comments.
The assistant professor resigned on October 25, 2021, a day after she lodged a police complaint alleging her Instagram account was compromised. “How else could the student see my photo? It was my private account. I suspect that another professor with whom I had shared the picture took a screenshot and shared it with that student.”