The vice-president of the Graduate Union (GU) has had his contract formally terminated today after sharing information on internal disciplinary investigations on his personal blog.

In a letter to Mrittunjoy Guha Majumdar informing him of his dismissal, the vice-president was charged with “gross misconduct and serious insubordination” for sharing “confidential” information about past investigations involving himself while serving as vice-president.

Speaking to Varsity, Majumdar said he had appealed to the GU and does “not agree with the Union’s finding that the information shared contains confidential information about the GU.

“I have faced sustained harassment and political bullying over the year, and this was an attempt at describing the same with as much anonymisation as possible.”

The post published on WordPress, entitled ‘The Battles of Cantabrigia’, refers to two cases in which Majumdar had been suspended and investigated by the GU following external complaints, including a disciplinary review carried out last week into an unauthorised event booking.

The cases are raised in the post as examples of what Majumdar describes as “the rise of political bullies in university spaces”, adding that complaints made against him during his time in office were “due to [him] not having conformed to their conceptual and ideological framework”.

In addition to last week’s case, he refers to a case of harassment in the summer which, according to the post, led to a three month suspension from duties and the commissioning of a private investigator by the Union. The case fell down on lack of evidence.

Majumdar alleges that the investigation cost the Union £3000.

The article was first password-protected then removed late last week, before it was re-published on Wednesday.

It was removed again in the early hours of Thursday. Majumdar says this “was after a directive by the General Manager Ali [Chahine].”

The disciplinary hearing last week, the outcome of which was not made public, concluded that Majumdar had been in violation of Union policy following a written complaint sent to the Union about the invitation of a speaker to an event which Majumdar had organised.

The event was later cancelled, and the review concluded that the vice-president had “misused GU resources” and “brought the Union in to [sic] disrepute” by scheduling the event without Union authorisation.

In the blog post, Majumdar defends his original decision to hold the event, claiming that “there was an ideological angle” to the complaints made against him, adding that “I have used these [booking privileges] for various other events that were never objected to.”

On his personal Twitter, Agnihotri, the proposed speaker subject to the written complaint, criticised the Union’s decision to discipline Majumdar over the booking, stating that “most of the campuses and media are infested by Commies/Leftists”.

In his own Twitter post concerning the dismissal, Majumdar denied sharing confidential information about the Union. The post has since been taken down.

In another post Majumdar described the dismissal as “Outrageous!”.

According to the formal notice, the vice-president’s dismissal follows “multiple earlier meetings” which had concluded that Majumdar’s conduct “was still unsatisfactory”, emphasising the vice-president’s repeated “misuse of social media that could have brought the Union into disrepute.″

The vice-president had been on a leave of absence since last Friday, and was due to leave office at the end of the month. Majumdar will receive his full wage for the month despite being dismissed.

In a statement to Varsity Majumdar said, “I believe that the Graduate Union has always stood up for me but lately I find a certain passing-of-the-buck for information that was not leaked by me, and yet forms the basis for this action.

“I have appealed to the Union at the moment, and I hope that this is taken seriously.

“I would also like to request the University community not to pass a judgement prematurely, since this affects my reputation, family, career and mental health. I have worked dedicatedly for the University, and I do not think I deserve the kind of hate and smear I have faced lately.”

The Graduate Union has been contacted for comment.

Updated 19 December 2019 13.01pm: This article was updated to include comment from Majumdar and with the information that the blog post has been removed again.