ALLAHABAD: Women students of Aligarh Muslim University will no longer be excluded from the central library of the 94-year-old institution. On Tuesday, AMU vice chancellor Lt Gen (retd) Zameeruddin Shah submitted in writing before the Allahabad high court that all students, including girls, have been allowed access to the Maulana Azad Library from the current session itself. He also clarified that undergraduate girl students of the university’s Abdullah Women’s College can also become members of the library.

Recording Shah’s assurances placed before the court, a division bench of chief justice Dr Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud and justice Pradeep Kumar Singh Baghel disposed of a PIL that alleged the VC had adopted a discriminatory attitude by denying girl students access to the Maulana Azad Library. The PIL was filed by Allahabad University law student Deeksha Dwivedi and three other students.

“If the male students are not barred in the main library, excluding of women students raises a serious question of propriety because a regulatory measure cannot target students on gender basis on the ground that the facility is overstretched,” the court said. “Any attempt to discriminate against women students would raise [the] serious risk of being frowned upon in society.”

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With regard to Shah saying there might be a safety problem for the women since their campus was 3km from the main library, the court directed in case he sought assistance, the DM and the SSP of Aligarh would provide all cooperation to the university administration.

According to the PIL, the VC had said that “four times more boys” would start flocking to the library if girls were given access to it. Shah had also said the presence of girl students in the library would breed indiscipline and disturb boys’ concentration, the PIL had alleged.

On November 14 the high court had issued a notice to the AMU VC and registrar, and said any effort to regulate the problem of overcrowding on the campus must be on a gender-neutral basis since its breach would go against the right to equality as provided in the Constitution. The court had said it expected the VC and registrar would deal with the matter as responsible statutory authorities and resolve the unseemly controversy having due regard to the letter and spirit of constitutional provisions.