Yesterday, Hetq printed an article entitled, “Armenian College in Calcutta Under Lock-Down; Students Blame Etchmiadzin Designated Director”. It received a wide response from our readers. Please note that the article was based on information received from students at the school. Given that the school’s administration requested the intervention of the police to resolve its internal problems, one can assume that the situation at the College is indeed tense and those developments, as presented in the article, are not exaggerated. We believe that the Armenian Apostolic Church has some explaining to do and that it must take steps not only to rectify the situation but to see that such incidents are avoided in the future. We will cover what happened in detail later. Before publishing the article, Hetq contacted the Mother See at Etchmiadzin to get its side of the story. It promised to get back to us today with their version of the story. A short time ago, we received the following official statement from the Information Desk at the Armenian College and Philanthropic Academy. With reference to the article published in "Hetq", we would like to clarify that one of the students was expelled on the grounds of serious breach of discipline and disrespectful insubordination of the school authority in presence of younger students -an act harmful for the well-being of the Institution. At the time of the departure of the said student, a few fellow students put up a stiff resistance, threatening violent consequences if their friend went away. Sensing that there could be a breach of peace in school which will be harmful to one and all, the police was requested to maintain peace on campus, only in case of an eventuality. The body language of the police and their posture in the picture will more than justify that they were there to maintain peace (merely as a mental deterrent) and not to hurt anyone. Moreover the presence of police inside the campus was for not more than three minutes which justifies the aforesaid intention. Anonymous people who planned the publication of this article are malicious and are operating with ulterior motives. They are trying to make a mountain out of a molehill and that too in an arena where they have no right to do so. Before taking the seat of judgment they should have contacted the concerned authorities, if they were genuinely interested in the welfare of Armenian College and not indulge in yellow journalism. Publishers of this article must also find out if a single child was even spoken to or touched by the police! As alleged in the report, if all communication modes were snapped for the students, how was the photograph taken and within half an hour the news reached different parts of the world! All children here enjoy freedom of expression to its maximum, and the report and photograph therein prove that a few of them misuse this freedom. As far as normalcy in school is concerned, the publishers of the article –are advised to contact every child, every authority related to school, its teachers and they will be surprised to know that their malice could not damage our peace, integrity and loving atmosphere and we have just another normal day here! INFORMATION SERVICE ARMENIAN COLLEGE & PHILANTHROPIC ACADEMY KOLKATA, INDIA 2nd July 2010