Amidst a controversy over the banning of a student e-zine by St Stephen's Principal Valson Thampu, its editor has now been stripped of a prize he was supposed to have received later this week from Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
Devansh Mehta, the editor and co-founder of the banned magazine -- 'St Stephen's Weekly' -- is a third-year Philosophy student who was selected by its faculty for the Rai Saheb Banarsi Das Memorial Prize.
He was to have received the prize from Kejriwal, who will be the Chief Guest at the college's graduation ceremony.
The said prize is awarded to an undergraduate student in Philosophy or Economy at the college who has shown a high standard of personal conduct and marked degree of curricular and co-curricular interaction.
"The person has misbehaved... The disciplinary committee has also said this in a report that he is guilty of misconduct and insulted the college. How can we award him?" Thampu told PTI.
"No one has denied him, he has disqualified himself for... the citation of which says it is for good conduct. How can person found guilty of misconduct be given such an award?" he asked.
The proscription of the weekly e-zine -- which went live on March 7 and registered over 2,000 hits on an interview of Thampu -- drew criticism from several quarters, including noted alumni members like former Chief Election Commissioner SY Quraishi and former Delhi Lokayukta, Justice Manmohan Sarin, who termed the move as "extreme" and disproportionate".
Thampu ordered banning of the e-zine, started by a group of four college students, for not taking his clearance on the content, and appointed a one-man disciplinary committee to look into the matter.
The disciplinary committee in its report submitted last week defended the principal's action and found the students guilty of violating the college's disciplinary norms.
Though the college is yet to take any action against the students on the basis of the disciplinary committee report, Devansh's name was today dropped from the list of awardees.
Teachers at the college have protested against the latest move, saying Thampu did not have the right to do so as it was a prize which was awarded on the basis of a departmental selection and had nothing to do with the principal.
