The ad hoc committee said Sunday that it would completely withdraw from the dispute if the university accepts its plan and the demonstrators still refuse to leave.

Faculty Buffer

The members of the committee have served as a buffer between the students and the administration. On Thursday night, several of them who were trying to protect students inside the buildings, were attacked by plainclothesmen from the New York police department. The attack was termed "a mistake" by the university.

With New York Mayor John V. Lindsay, the committee is also credited with persuading Kirk not to call in police earlier to remove the demonstrators as he had planned late last week.

Kirk also said tonight that he would yield to a request to discuss the Morningside Park gymnasium issue with the mayor. The mayor is said to favor an alternate site for the gym, which was scheduled to be built on a site leased to Columbia in 1961 for only $3000 a year. Construction has already been halted temporarily at the mayor's request.

The demonstrators now appear to have won clear victory on the primary objective of their demonstration--ending the gym construction.

The gym was first seen as a magnanimous gesture when it was proposed in the late 1950's. Two gyms were planned--a $10 million one for the university and a $1.6 million one for residents of the neighboring Morningside Heights and West Harlem community.

Columbia agreed to pay for the construction of the community gym and cover the maintenance cost of $75,000 a year. The gym would include a regulation-size basketball court, lockers, showers, weight rooms, and a 75-foot-by-20-foot swimming pool.

Community opposition to the gym has developed only recently. Many Harlem leaders argued that they were not consulted on the plans. They also complained that the gyms are a "Jim Crow" set-up, with separate entrances for the predominantly black people of the community and the predominantly white students.

They also say that Columbia is trying to "buy off" the city with its gymnasium plan. They argue that no private corporation has the right to take over park land.

For community leaders and protesting students, the gym has become the symbol of what they see as a land-gobbling university. Columbia has acquired over 100 buildings in recent years in the area of the campus. The University has evicted tenants and torn down buildings to make way for Columbia classrooms and dormitories.

Recently, Columbia sought housing for faculty members in suburban Orange-town, New York. As an explanation for this, columnist Jimmy Breslin reported that Kirk said, "Well, you know, we have a terrible crime problem around the school.