‘Hope Columbia comes to its senses’: Indian PhD student Ranjani Srinivasan feels 'betrayed' by university
ByHT News Desk | Written by Shivam Pratap Singh
Mar 27, 2025 04:11 PM IST
Srinivasan is still hopeful the university will consider her appeal and reinstate her enrollment.
Indian PhD student Ranjani Srinivasan, who self-reported herself to Canada after her student visa was revoked on allegations of ‘supporting Hamas’, is feeling betrayed by Columbia University.
Ranjani Srinivasan is a student of Urban Planning at Columbia University(X/Sec_Noem)
Ranjani Srinivasan is a student of Urban Planning at Columbia University(X/Sec_Noem)
In an interview with Al Jazeera, Srinivasan said she never expected her institution to let her down, but that is exactly what she feels it did.
“I spent five years at Columbia, working – I don’t know – maybe 100 hours a week sometimes. I never expected the institution to let me down. But it did,” she said in the interview.
Srinivasan, who was pursuing her doctorate in public planning before the Donald Trump administration accused her of ‘supporting Hamas' and revoked her visa that was renewed in December last year, is still hopeful the university will consider her appeal and reinstate her enrollment.
“I hope Columbia comes to its senses and re-enrolls me. All the requirements for my PhD are complete, and whatever is left, I don’t even need to be in the US for. So I’m trying to appeal to Columbia to do that,” she added.
The Ranjani Srinivasan story
Ranjani Srinivasan, a doctoral student at Columbia University in New York, first got an email from the United States consulate in Chennai on March 5, stating that her student visa had been revoked.
While the 37-year-old was still trying to make sense of it all, contacting her PhD group and the university authorities, ICE agents showed up at her door.
US homeland security secretary Kristi Noem accused her of being a “terrorist sympathiser” in a post on X.
Srinivasan flew out of New York to Canada on March 11, four days before Noem’s post, after concluding that she could be arrested. A grainy security camera footage from New York’s LaGuardia Airport showing her dragging a suitcase went viral throughout the world.
Srinivasan is currently living with her friends and family in Canada, still hoping to complete her course from Columbia.
Share this article
Columbia University
United States
CanadaCanada
Read breaking news, latest updates from US, UK, Pakistan and other countries across the world on topics related to politics,crime, and national affairs.
See More
Read breaking news, latest updates from US, UK, Pakistan and other countries across the world on topics related to politics,crime, and national affairs.