BEIJING — A major university in southern China has barred a professor from teaching after female students went public with sexual harassment allegations against him, unhappy that the university had not taken swifter, firmer action.

Sun Yat-sen University in the city of Guangzhou had received complaints against the professor, Zhang Peng, at least as early as April, when the #MeToo movement was rippling into China, emboldening current and former students to denounce molestation by professors.

But the university dealt with the initial complaint against Professor Zhang, a rising star in primatology who is about 40, through low-key, internal discipline. It announced his removal from teaching on Tuesday, only after a Chinese journalist, Huang Xueqin, reported that Professor Zhang had grabbed, hugged and forcibly kissed other women. Four students and a female teacher had lodged formal complaints against him in May, the report said.

“Tell me why he has still been able to continue on at Sun Yat-sen after he’s hurt so many female students,” one of the students said, according to the report. “Why would the school treat a ‘teacher pinching and hugging and kissing students’ as a trivial matter?”