bhubaneswar a tug of war has started between two groups of students over the number of llb seats in university law college vani vihar after it lowered the admission strength to 80 from 160 from current academic year one section of students owing allegiance to the ruling bjd demonstrated in front of utkal university vicechancellor p k sahoos office demanding restoration of the total number of seats to 160 another group supporters of the congress gheraoed registrar banani mohantys office protesting any move to further increase the seats to 160 on the pretext that the admissions are already over the university reducing the strength of a course which is in high demand depriving many poor students from learning the university cant do so unilaterally as the infrastructure and faculty continue to remain available for 160 students we have requested the vc to restore the original strength said sangram patra a first year law student and general secretary of biju chhatra janata dal this group of students had earlier staged a protest in august after which the syndicate the apex decision making of the varsity on august 27 authorized the vc to take a final call on the restoration provided the teaching council a body of teachers recommends accordingly the council supported the increase in the strength to 160 around 800 students had applied for admission in the course after the syndicates decision and the teaching councils recommendation became public students supporting the congress staged a protest outside the registrars office opposing the move to revert to last years strength of 160 the university cant take such a decision to hike the number of seats again when the admission process is already over it is being done to favour a group of students owing allegiance to the ruling party we will protest any such move said ajay pani former president of students union of the law college and a congress supporter documents reveal that originally the teaching council on march 6 recommended the university to reduce the capacity of fiveyear integrated law course from 60 to 30 and not of llb it also decided to debar hostel accommodation to integrated law students the recommendations were made on the pretext that mainly students of integrated law were involved in most incidents of campus violence proceedings of the council meeting said referring to an incident of students clash on march 4 the council noted that the hostel authorities were reluctant to accommodate law students because of their active part in students unrest however while implementing the decision the university reduced the strength of threeyear llb course to 80 and made all the seats as llb honours course despite attempts the vc could not be reached for comment the registrar banani mohanty when contacted declined to speak on the issue i cant make a comment as the matter doesnt relate to the registrars office she said