An ex-professor of St. Xavier’s University of Kolkata has decided to take the matter to the Calcutta High Court, months after she was pressured to give her resignation, after complaints from a parent were made over her “objectionable” photographs on Instagram. The woman says that a writ petition against the university authorities will be booked at the court concerned by next week.
The woman who wished to stay anonymous, shared how a “kangaroo court” was held on October 7 in the presence of the Vice-Chancellor (V-C) Felix Raj, registrar Asish Mitra, where the woman claims she was “intimidated, bullied and taunted with sexually coloured remarks” and “objectionable insinuations” without any provocation or justification.
The professor said “ A parent of an undergraduate student had found that his son was looking at my photos on Instagram. The boy found the pictures inappropriate, and borderlining nudity. The pictures were of me dressed ijn a blue swimsuit, which I had posted on instagram last year, weeks before joining the university. There is no way those pictures can be accessible to him, weeks after I posted them as an Instagram story by default only stays for 24 hours. Also, my Instagram profile is private, not “public”. Those pictures would be impossible to be viewed by the student weeks later.”
She is still mystified over how the university got access to those pictures. She says that she was humiliated over the whole scenario and it was embarrassing to be in a meeting where her private pictures were being circulated among people unknown to her, without her consent. She strongly believes that either her account was hacked, or else someone took screenshots of the story when it was posted and then circulated them. These are the only 2 ways that the mystery can be solved, she explains.
The academic who has a doctorate from two European universities joined the university in August last year. She received a call from the Vice-Chancellor’s office asking that she be present for a meeting with V-C Felix Raj at 4 pm the same day.
The letter from the parent said that the parents were appalled to find their son looking at a professor’s pictures in which she was dressed in skimpy clothes. The parent believed it was obscene and vulgar for an 18-year old to view his professor in such sexually explicit pictures on a public platform.
The professor raised an objection over the way she was made to resign. Her resignation letter addressed to the V-C demanded how they had not offered any explanation over how the photographs which were posted months before she joined the organization and that too on her private account, were made available. She also questioned how they had not provided any assurance that her private photos would be destroyed. Instead, arbitrary standards of morality had been used to shame and embarrass her.
