In AMU’s forgotten Kerala campus, students wage a lonely war against maladministration and embezzlement
In Aligarh Muslim University’s Malappuram campus, students uncovered financial irregularities running into lakhs forcing the provost to resign earlier this month. It has been a battle for the Sachar Committee’s promise of educational excellence for India’s marginalised communities.
Published on: 20 April 2025, 09:37 am
NESTLED AMIDST THE VERDANT HILLS of Kerala’s Malappuram district lies a campus of national importance that has remained largely invisible from public scrutiny. The Aligarh Muslim University Centre at Malappuram (‘AMUMC’) is home to over four hundred students from more than seventeen different states. Lately, it has become an unlikely epicenter of recurring protests against what students allege is entrenched administrative corruption.
At the heart of these accusations stand two figures – the Director and the Provost – whose financial management has sparked unprecedented student unrest and raised fundamental questions about institutional oversight and accountability. On reaching the director and the provost for an interview about the ongoing protests and corruption allegations against them, no response was received.
A pattern of financial irregularities
The current crisis erupted in March when some students uncovered a probable systematic embezzlement by the administration. It is alleged by the student fraternity that the provost working in collusion with the director has misappropriated surplus funds amounting to Rs 3,88,408 for the 2023-24 session. This discovery was particularly troubling since the mess operations are entirely funded by student fees, with the parent institution in Aligarh repeatedly citing financial constraints for its inability to support its satellite campuses adequately.
“I have lived on campus for the past three years, and each year there has been at least one protest over inadequate medical facilities, etc.,” said Shamim Akhtar, a student leader from the Senior Hall (boys’) in AMUMC
Student protests eventually led the administration to agree to adjust the surplus amount against the upcoming month’s mess fees. However, this concession appears to have triggered a retaliatory response from the administration. On April 8 the provost’s office issued a notification claiming a sudden and unprecedented deficit of Rs 3,95,157 for March, the month of Ramadan. The timing and amount – strikingly similar to the previously disputed surplus – immediately aroused suspicion among the student body.
Adding to the students’ concerns, this alleged deficit occurred during a period when substantial photographic evidence documents the serving of stale and expired food of substandard quality in the mess facilities. Further compounding these irregularities, an iftar party was organised during Ramadan which was presented as a personal gesture by the director and provost. However, sources within the administration suggested that only a portion of the funding came from them, with the remainder drawn from student mess funds.
