Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)

Although there’s no denying that Christian missionaries have made a great contribution to the growth and dissemination of English-medium school and higher education, there’s rising awareness within the country’s influential middle class that priest-educators, i.e, men and women of the cloth also discharging academic roles and duties, are becoming obsolete.Bound by strict laws of celibacy, Jesuit (and Church of Rome) academics plagued by a rash of paedophilia scandals worldwide, are out of step with 21st century zeitgeist.

This rising sentiment was dramatically confirmed by official harassment and hounding of a highly qualified woman professor of English literature of St. Xavier’s University, Kolkata (SXU, formerly St. Xavier’s College, conferred university status by the University Grants Commission in 2017) which prompted her resignation. Her offence: prior to signing up with SXU in 2021, she had posted swimsuit photographs of herself on a social media platform (Instagram).

This photograph was chanced upon by a first-year student of the university in October last year whose outraged parent complained to SXU’s founding vice chancellor Fr. (Dr.) Felix Raj, an alum of Loyola College, Chennai, St. Joseph’s College, Trichy, awarded an economics in Ph D by Rabindra Bharati University, Santiniketan and formerly principal of St. Xavier’s College, Kolkata (2009-17).

According to this woman professor awarded Ph Ds by two European universities, Dr. Raj and registrar Asish Mitra intimidated, bullied and made “sexually-coloured remarks” during a kangaroo court trial held on October 7 last year. “I was told that my failure to voluntarily resign would be punished by the lodging of a criminal case against me for putting up objectionable photographs, and I was also forced to submit a letter of apology for inappropriate conduct, hurting the image of the institution,” wrote the professor in a detailed account of her persecution by the SXU management published by Indian Express (August 20).

Subsequently, on second thought after tendering her resignation on October 25, in February, 2022 the professor wrote a letter to the SXU management seeking reinstatement and a formal apology. In response, the university sent her a legal notice demanding Rs.99 crore for “causing irreparable damage” to the university. On receiving the notice, the former professor filed a FIR (first information report) at a local police station against the SXU management under sections 354 (c) (voyeurism) and 509 (outraging modesty of a woman) of the Indian Penal Code 1860.

Unsurprisingly, there was a massive public uproar in Kolkata immediately after the news was published in the online portal Wire (August 10). SXU students staged campus protests on August 10 followed by several student-run and women organisations holding protests before SXU gates.

Support for the persecuted professor has also poured in from St. Xavier’s College alumni, gender activists and leading lights of Kolkata including mental health activist Ratnaboli Ray, psychologist Payoshni Mitra, former president and one-time SFI leader Anisha Pal. In a post, Ray wrote “that the SXU management needs to extend its periphery.”

Since then, an online petition addressed to West Bengal education minister Bratya Basu, demanding disciplinary action against vice chancellor Dr. Raj has been signed by 21,700 alumni and citizens. According to the petition, the SXU management has set a “dangerous precedent” for students, teachers and other institutions. “Such an incident points to an otherwise aspirational university becoming a hotbed for moral policing as opposed to being a safe and progressive environment for teachers and students alike,” reads the petition.

Yet perhaps the most chilling conclusion that right thinking academics are drawing from this contretemps is the minimal value that academics in the highest offices of universities accord to faculty. In this particular instance, this persecuted professor with two Ph Ds had the choice to teach in any higher education institution worldwide. Yet she chose to serve in her native city — Kolkata.

Instead of conferring highest value to this human resource, the sex-obsessed top management of SXU — “like the base Indian” — recklessly threw a pearl away richer than all its tribe.