IMPHAL: An order by the Centre to reconstitute the fact-finding committee on the alleged financial and administrative irregularities by Manipur University (MU) vice-chancellor Adya Prashad Pandey failed to break the deadlock between protesters and the government."We will continue our protest until the order is rectified by the HRD ministry," said members of the Manipur University Students' Union, Manipur University Teachers' Association and Manipur University Staff Association, who have been leading the protest.The agitation, which has been on for more than two months, would have ended had the MU community been satisfied with the Centre's move to reconstitute the panel looking into the allegations. The protesters had said the earlier panel was a "biased one". On Thursday, a memorandum of agreement was signed by the Centre, the state and the MU community, which had signalled an end to the impasse. With Saturday's development, however, it became evident that the agitation will continue."Though it was agreed that an independent two-member fact-finding committee would be set up, the (HRD) ministry conveniently dropped the term 'independent'," said an MU protester. The reconstituted committee comprises Justice T Nandakumar Singh, retired acting chief justice of Meghalaya high court, and MK Choudhary, former vice-chancellor of Tezpur University Another contentious point was the 15-day leave for Pandey that the MU community had demanded, saying that he should not resume work until follow-up action on the inquiry report by a competent authority was taken up. "In a crude and blatant manner, the issue has been completely left out of the HRD order," a statement issued by the protesters said."We strongly feel that these two non-honouring of the items of the agreement (the other being the omission of the word "impendent" in the HRD order) as clear violations of the mutual understanding and thus amounting to breach of trust," the statement added.

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