In the row over the suicide of student Sushant Rohilla at Amity Law School Delhi (IP), its director Prof Dr BP Singh Sehgal and political science professor Dr Isheeta Rutabhasini have both resigned.

A university spokesperson confirmed the development and said that the reason for their resignation was “considering the sentiments and emotions of students”.

We have not been able to get through to Sehgal or Rutabhasini at the time of publication and are awaiting a full statement by the university.

Update 19:45: One student who wished to remain anonymous, commented: “It was imperative that they resign. This is merely the first step and there is still a long way to go in getting justice for our friend along with ensuring that that changes are brought to the college so that no other student ever has to face such apathy and arbitrariness.”

Update 22:08: Read the fact-finding committee report here.

Students and alumni of Amity Law School, affiliated to Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha (GGSIP) University, as well as members of Rohilla’s family have been protesting on social media (and some on campus) about his suicide, claiming that the university was insensitive towards his plight and inflexibility in its attendance policies.

Criminal complaint filed against college by family

The family has lodged a criminal complaint with the police against the college on 17 August, said Sushant Rohilla’s uncle, Dinesh Rohilla, who is an advocate also running for election at a Delhi bar association. However, no first information report (FIR) has been registered to date.

“They [Amity] constituted a committee regarding this incident and today they have given the result that 2 have resigned,” he commented, adding that this had happened only on account of pressure from protesting students and media, and perhaps also the pressure of the police complaint the family had filed.

“We are gathering more documents,” added Dinesh Rohilla, regarding the complaint. “Students are coming forward on their own and we are getting emails with Sushant, in which sometimes serious concerns we found.”

We have reached out to Amity for comment on the complaint.

Bigger picture: Attendance system opaque

However, students concerns in their protests have been wider than just this specific case, which was just one example of the arbitrary rules at the university.

“The attendance policy that exists in our college is very very opaque and vague,” one student told us on condition of anonymity, echoing concerns of others spoken to. “There’s a general arbitrariness that exists in the system and not for others.”

While formally the GGSIP-stipulated attendance requirement was 75%, with a 5% discretion given to a college’s director, in practice many Amity Law School (IP) students did not make this requirement said the student.

“There’s a requirement for 50% of attendance, over which they’d consider extracurricular activity,” said the student, adding that the system was “not documented, but just circulated through word of mouth” by faculty. For extra curricular activities (or so-called “on-duty (OD) attendance”), there were no clear rules for what could be counted and how many hours could constitute.

Unlike at Amity University’s law school, which was on the same campus, there was also no electronic system for checking attendance at Amity Law School (IP) in real time, which meant that most students were left to guess at whether they made the cut or not.

University released some attendance records

The university released at a Wednesday press conference a notice dated 11 May, showing the names of 19 students who were also detained along with Sushant Rohilla, who was listed with a “physical attendance status” of 42%.

Somewhat strangely, all 18 other students also detained on the list had ranges of physical attendance statuses of between 9% and 45%.

When asked why not a single student out of the more than 1,000 students in five years seemed to have had attendance between 45% and 75%, according to the list, the Amity spokesperson said: “There is no student who is short of 75% and who has been allowed to write the exam.”

She also added that Rohilla’s actual physical attendance had only been 29%, which was raised to 42% with “OD” attendance for his extracurricular activities. “He had just participated in one moot court,” she said.

She did not respond to queries on whether there was an unwritten policy at Amity (IP) that 50% attendance and above allowed students to claim OD attendance, and declined to release full records of every student’s attendance (though added that these could be obtained from GGSIP University under RTI).

The Amity fact finding committee report

Director BP Singh Sehgal’s bio

According to the university website, the now-resigned Sehgal took over as director in April 2013:

Prof. (Dr.) BP Singh Sehgal took over as Director of Amity Law School, Delhi in April 2013 after working for almost two years in the office of Vice Chancellor, Amity University (UP) as OSD to VC

Prof. Sehgal superannuated from University of Jammu after serving there for more than 35 years in multifarious capacities including Dean Academic Affairs, Chief Coordinator for Offsite Campuses of the University; Director, Directorate of Distance Education; Director, The Law School; Head of Law Department; Dean of Faculty of Law; Director, Youth Welfare; Director Legal Aid Clinic, etc.

He participated in various international programmes, and attended Conference of Asian Forum of Parliamentarians on Population and Development in 1984, international conference on Terrorism organized by International Institute of Non-Aligned Studies, 1955, international conference on Human Rights and Role of Mass Media by International Institute of Non-Aligned Studies, 1995; participated in International Centre for University Human Rights Teaching, 16th Session, 1988 Strassbourg, France; awarded Fellowship for attending the 19th Study Session on Human Rights by International Institute of Human Rights, Strasbourg, France, 1988, awarded Fellowship for internship at International Committee for Red Cross at Geneva (Switzerland), 1988, selected for participation in The Hague Academy External Programme 1990, presented a paper in International Symposium on Victimology at Brazil 1991, participated in Asian Development Bank Funded IUCN/APCL/UNEP Programme on Capacity Building for Environmental Legal Education in the Asia-Pacific Region at National University of Singapore, 1998 and also delivered lectures in the Faculty of Law, Nepal in 2011.

Prof. Sehgal has worked at various United Nations Peace Keeping Missions. He was Legal Officer and was responsible for Civil Registry Department in newly created country, East Timor in the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) during the first democratic elections in 2001. He further supervised the Presidential elections in Afghanistan during 2003-05 and worked as International Registration Supervisor, Provincial Training Officer and Field Coordinator in United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

Prof. Sehgal has organized various National Seminars, authored/edited 7 books and published more than 50 research papers on various social legal aspects in national and international journals.

Prof. Sehgal was a member of Editorial Board of prestigious Journal of Indian Law Institute, 2003 and Kashmir Journal of Legal Studies. He also remained an advisor to Union Public Service Commission, Uttarakhand Public Service Commission, J&K Public Service Committees, Life Member of Indian Institute of Public Administration and a member of academic bodies of various Universities.