University evicted brings case to court

Protests in front of the Murmansk Regional Duma led to an eviction from Murmansk State Technical University according to former student Anton Kosterin. The University claims that he had failed on several exams and that he had debt to the University.

Kosterin says that his progress at school was no worse than a lot of other students, and that the eviction was only due to his protests. After a lawsuit by Kosterin he will meet in the Murmansk District Court on March 21st, in a fight for his right to continue his studies at the University.

“Our view on this situation has not changed. Kosterin was evicted because of his bad results. There are no other reasons for us to evict this student. We hope that the court will acknowledge that we have legal basis for this action and that the case can come to an end,” says Tatiana Mishankina at Moscow State Technical University to news web site M51.

“Successful fraud?”
The troubles for Kosterin all started in the evening after the Duma elections on December 4th 2011. As the results from the election became public, Kosterin sat at home watching the news. However, it was not the results but the numerous reports on what people believed were election fraud that caught his attention.

“I was so disappointed. The government says that everything is OK, but all the reports on fraud show that this is not the fact,” says Anton Kosterin.

Kosterin felt he had to do something to show his disappointment on the election and decided to do some kind of a quiet protest, which still showed his view. With a simple poster asking the ironic quiestion “Successful fraud?” he took stand in front of the Regional duma in Murmansk.

A news team from Arctic TV did a news story on his protest, and within hours his action was known all over town, followed by a lot of debates on blogs and in social media.

Kosterin was satisfied with his protest and thought this was the end of the story. However, two days later as he arrived at the University to complete an exam, he was told that he had been evicted from University. The official reason was that his grades were too bad and that he had not completed the obligatory exams for his study.

“There were a lot of students who had just as bad grades as me and some had not completed even more exams than me. But I was the only one to be evicted,“ says Kosterin.

Fight for his future
In Kosterins opinion the University has just found a random reason to evict him, while the real reason is his protest outside the regional duma. Since the eviction he has been fighting against the university, trying to prove that the punishment was not for his bad grades but for his political protest.

“I know this will be a long battle, but I have no plans on giving in now. I want to complete my study and get my graduation.”

Kostering does not regret anything. He believes he still has a lot of possibilities for his future carrier, despite the consequences.

“I would definitely do the same once more if I had the chance. I would only prepare better”