Confusion reigned supreme during the inauguration of Vinoba Bhave University’s (VBU) three-day inter-college youth festival Jhoomar on Wednesday with students crying foul over accommodation facilities.
While majority of 550 students, who started arriving for the festival since Tuesday evening, expressed their displeasure over the lack of drinking water facility at the venues — a guest house, girls hostel and at the MBD department— where they were putting up, a handful alleged that the rooms were dirty.
“I landed at the university on Tuesday evening with a bottle of packaged water. However, trouble started as soon as I exhausted my stock of water. We couldn’t locate any drinking water taps in our vicinity,” said a student of BSK College, Dhanbad.
He added that, despite the troubles faced by them, students avoided collecting water from bathroom taps that might have invited stomach-related diseases.
“The authorities should have made provisions of mineral water jars for the participants,” added another student. The authorities later summoned a couple of water tankers from Hazaribagh municipality.
The confusion stretched to Wednesday morning, with participants going hungry, as they did not know where food was being served, in the absence of any direction from VBU officials most of whom were busy at Vinodini Tarwey Park, where the inauguration ceremony was to be held.
The fest, which has a budget of Rs 6 lakh, was initially scheduled to be inaugurated by Governor Syed Ahmed. However an official communiqué received from the governor’s office on Tuesday stated that Ahmed would not inaugurate the event sending university officials scampering to find a replacement.
State HRD minister Baiyadnath Ram, who was roped in as Ahmed’s replacement, reached the venue at 12.30pm, a good 90 minutes after the scheduled time, keeping the crowd waiting in the scorching afternoon sun.
The confusion was complete, when local MLA Saurabh Narayan Singh, was introduced as Hazaribagh MP Yashwant Sinha leaving the crowds confused.
Later, while addressing the gathering Ram spoke at length about the prevalent corruption in the society.
