Delhi HC stays suspension of St Stephens's college student involved in magazine row

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court ordered a stay on the suspension of a student of St Stephens's college involved in a row over an online magazine.

The court further adjourned the matter till May 21.

Devansh Mehta, editor and co-founder of online magazine 'St Stephen's Weekly', had challenged his suspension and banning of the magazine's publication.

On April 15, Mehta was suspended till April 23 after a one-man inquiry committee appointed by St Stephen's principal Valson Thampu found him guilty of "breach of discipline".

Mehta, a third-year philosophy student, was allegedly suspended for launching the online magazine.

Last month, the college banned the e-zine started by Mehta and other students over an interview of the principal, which, he said, had not been cleared. The e-zine went live on March 7 and registered over 2,000 hits on the interview.

Filing the petition, Mehta had called the ban "arbitrary, illegal, malafide and shockingly unreasonable".

"The main malicious accusations against the petitioner (Mehta) in this case are twofold - that of publishing an online magazine without taking prior approval from the principal and subsequently conveying the news of the proscription of this magazine, to the media," said the plea.

Mehta sought "quashing of the order banning/suspending publication of the St Stephen's Weekly, stay on the suspension order and restraining the principal from taking any further action against him".

Mehta has also requested in his petition that he be awarded the Rai Saheb Banarsi Das Memorial Prize, for which he was earlier selected by the college. He was dropped from the list in the wake of the controversy.

In an e-mail last month, Thampu said: "It is unacceptable that, despite being explicitly told not to publish anything (especially my interview before I had the time to go through and clear the text) you went ahead in defiance. It denotes an awkward failure of education and that is why I cannot take it lightly."

(With IANS inputs)