ATSUM alleges MU of deliberately failing tribal students based on ethnicity

The All Tribal Students' Union (ATSUM) has stated that in the five months long of unabated ethnic fighting in Manipur, the Kuki-Zo tribal students continued to bear the brunt of the crisis where they have been subjected to all sorts of discrimination even in a centre of learning, the Manipur University.

In a press communique issued on Wednesday, ATSUM said a complaint has been has been received by the union from the Indigenous Tribal Leaders' Forum (ITLF) that there was an open discrimination towards the tribal students in the recently declared 6th Semester exam result in the Psychology department of Manipur University.

"76 students of Kuki-Zo community from Rayburn College appeared in the examination but only 10 students were deemed to have passed the exam. But what baffled the people most is that a student was given a score of -2 (minus two) in Elective English and many students received a score of 0 (zero) in certain papers despite the subject having both theory and practical components," said Mr. Kaikho Hopseson Mao, Education Secretary, ATSUM.

"This amply proves that the university deliberately failed the tribal students based on their ethnicity," he said.

The story did not end there, Hopeson continued that as the students who were aghast at the outcome of the exam results made a verbal complaint to the Controller of Examination of university. An updated result was released within a span of 2-3 hours. In the revised result the number of students who passed the exam shot up from 10 to 41.

"Never in the history of any university, result have been manipulated and declared in this way. It clearly shows that marks and the result have arbitrarily being fixed with malice," ATSUM alleged, adding that examination results are no longer assessed based on the performance and integrity of the student but based on the ethnicity of the student in Manipur.

Highly condemning over the matter, ATSUM opined that it needs to be investigated thoroughly. It also urged that necessary arrangement has to be made for the Kuki-Zo tribal students by the concerned authority so that they can pursue the studies without discrimination and malice.