Taking cognizance of the minor blast in the laboratory of HS Judge Dental College, Panjab University, Chandigarh, Professor R C Sobti, the Vice-Chancellor, constituted a four-member committee to probe the incident and suggest corrective steps to be taken by the university.
The committee, comprising Professor K Gauba, Director Principal, H S Judge Dental College, Dr Ravi Gupta, Fellow, Dr R K Khullar, Panjab University Health Centre and M Joshi, Special Officer, VC office, (convener), will submit report within three days.
Professor Sobti added, ?The committee will look into the incident from different perspectives in order to find out the causes that led to the incident and also recommend corrective action to the taken by the PU administration so that no such incident takes place in the future on the PU campus.?
The incident happened when Manpreet Kaur, a student of second year, was working on a spirit lamp in the lab. Hardly had she lit the lamp, the lamp blasted and the blast burnt her face including her eyebrows, eyelashes and cheek. Though she was given medical care, there was no emergency kit present in the lab to avert a major incident from taking place.
The students who were under fear after this incident communicated their concerns to the director of the institute for using outdated tools and apparatus for experiments while the ones which should be used are lying defunct in the labs. Also, the absence of emergency kits in the labs was brought to the notice of the authorities added the students of second year while talking to Newsline.