Law Academy stir a public issue: VS

Thiruvananthapuram: CPI-M veteran and former Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan on Monday countered his party Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan's statement that the stir at the Kerala Law Academy College is just a student protest and nothing else.

"It's not a student protest, it is a public issue and the state government must act and not succumb to the powerful," he told reporters here.

Kodiyeri, after visiting agitating members of the Students Federation of India on Saturday, had said the agitation should not be politicised. “It should be seen as a students’ agitation. Attempt is being made by BJP to give a political colour to the stir,” he had said.

The united protest by the students reached its 20th day on Monday, demanding Academy Principal Lekshmi Nair's resignation due to her unbecoming behaviour and alleged nepotism.

The private college, set up here in 1968, has till now enjoyed absolute support from successive state governments, enabling it to have an 11-acre campus besides a prime plot of land in the heart of the city, where it has built a commercial complex.

Now with pressure mounting, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan is understood to have given an ultimatum to his cabinet colleague State Education Minister C. Raveendranath to see that things are resolved at the earliest.

Meanwhile, Lekshmi Nair is hoping that a petition that's coming up at the high court on Tuesday, gives them some relief.