Protesting asst profs, librarians detained

Jalandhar, July 3

A group of assistant professors and librarians were detained by the city police after they staged a protest outside the Chief Minister’s rented residence in Jalandhar Cantt here today.

The protesters, protesting under the banner of 1,158 Assistant Professors and Librarians Front, Punjab (Government College), have been voicing their demand for recruitment since the past many months.

Jaswinder Kaur, a 100 per cent disabled assistant professor and the state convener of the front, revealed that they were initially scheduled to meet Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann at 9 am to discuss their grievances. However, it wasn’t until 3:30 pm that they were granted an audience with the CM’s sister, who informed them that due to prior commitments, CM Mann would be unavailable to meet until after July 15. Their demands would be addressed only after this date.

“Frustrated by the lack of a meeting despite the scheduled time, we began a dharna outside the CM’s residence,” Kaur recounted. “The police then forcibly removed us, placing us into buses and detaining us at the Jamsher police station until late evening”, she added.

Kaur further criticised CM Mann’s previous statements, wherein he claimed to have rented a house in Jalandhar to make governmental processes more accessible, negating the need for people to travel to Chandigarh. “Yet here we are, assistant professors and librarians, waiting for a promised meeting that never happened,” she lamented.

The situation escalated when Congress MLA from Adampur, Sukhwinder Kotli, arrived at the police station upon learning of the detentions. Kotli went live on social media, condemning AAP government over the use of force to suppress dissent.