JNU attack: Is India not listening to its youth?
Alumni of Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University are Nobel Prize-winning economists, former Prime Ministers of Libya and Nepal, and many prominent politicians, diplomats, artists and scholars of their respective fields. JNU is also internationally known for its academic quality and research. This university is one of the highest-ranked institutes in India.
Still, JNU could not stop the carrying such fame, sticks, stones and iron rods from entering the campus. On Sunday evening, these masked armed men attacked the campus of JNU. They attacked students and teachers and also damaged properties. These machinations continued to create havoc, and the police refused to interfere for nearly an hour. During this time, outside the campus gate, another crowd had gathered. Who was raising nationalist slogans and targeting ambulances who had come to take the injured students along with journalists? About 40 people were injured in this violence.
Right and left students have held each other responsible for this violence. Most eyewitnesses told journalists that most of the members of this violent mob of masked people belonged to the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad. And many outsiders were with him. ABVP is a student organization of the current ruling Bharatiya Janata Party of India. Read More
On the upper hand, the reason behind the violence in JNU on Sunday is the controversy arising out of the increase in hostel fees. Due to this controversy, there has been a state of chaos in the JNU campus for the last several months. University administration officials allege that this attack was carried out by a group of students who were opposing the current process of registration of new students. Most of the people believe that this statement of the university administration means that the leftist students are responsible for the violence, who are opposing the increase in fees. Read More
But, people are more afraid of the fact that the ruling party BJP wants to suppress the voice raising in their protest on the campus. Traditionally, leftist politics has been dominated by JNU. But, ever since the BJP led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, riding the wave of Hindu nationalism, has come to power, JNU has been continuously targeted. Treason cases have been registered for giving speeches on students. Apart from this, BJP and partisan news channels have tried to spoil the image of JNU by calling it ‘anti-national’. JNU students are called ‘Urban Naxals’.
The attack on the JNU campus on Sunday tells many things about the current situation in India.
The first thing is that it has become clear from this incident that the rule of law and order in Delhi, the capital of the country, has completely ended. In Delhi, its responsibility is with the very powerful Home Minister of India, Amit Shah. If a violent mob can create a ruckus by entering the campus of one of the most spectacular universities in India. And if the police fail to protect the students and teachers, then many people have a question as to who is safe in such a situation?
Apart from this, critics say that according to the fear of BJP’s beat and run politics, the same situation is being created, which is very worrying.
Ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah have come to power, they have continued to relentlessly demoralize their opponents and portray them as villains, that too unabashed. He calls his opponents sometimes anti-national and sometimes urban Naxalites. Political analysts say that ‘all the protesters have been called as traitors and an atmosphere has been created in which unrestrained violence is taking place by tearing the law and order.’ Today, an atmosphere of suspicion and hatred is being created in a very organized manner.
The result of this is that the tolerance for the voices and thoughts that arise in the protest is becoming less and less. A senior journalist who is a student of JNU says that the incident on campus on Sunday has proved that, ‘We are living in an era where the voice of the opponents of ideology in educational institutions will be crushed with extreme ruthlessness. Under these circumstances, the government will do more and more that there will remain a silent audience.
According to Rakesh Butbyal, author of JNU: The Making of a University, “There is a lot of diversity among students of JNU, outside of Oxford or Cambridge. Students from all sections of society come to study. Feudalists of India and divided Into terms of society, this university is ‘like a revolution’ where the students of rich and poor, weak and influential, urban and rural India meet, live together and read. Says a member of the JNU faculty that “what happened on Sunday night at JNU, he was never on this campus.”
However, violent conflict in JNU campus is not new. In the 1980s, there was a conflict between the students and teachers about the change in the admission process in the university.
According to the headlines of the newspapers of that era, there was an atmosphere of ‘anarchy’ in the campus. Students attacked the teachers’ homes on the campus. According to many people, the police had beaten the students. Many students were arrested. And 40 of these were kicked out of the campus. Rakesh writes that since that violent struggle, power had become a new and very important thing in the politics of JNU campus.
But this time the situation is completely different. In JNU campus, the government’s attitude towards violence is very cold. The government has categorically refused to communicate with the protesting students. Since last December, this is the third time that protesting students have been targeted in the campus of a university in India.
Students in two major universities of Delhi have also faced violence and ruthlessness of the police. At the same time, the police also committed violence with the students of Aligarh University in northern India.
According to Amnesty International, India, “The government’s campaign to make students a consistent villain has increased the risk of such violent attacks on students. And the government allows those who commit such attacks to act fearlessly. Now it is very important That is, the government should listen to its citizens. “
The most worrying thing is that India’s opposition parties have failed to raise their voice for the interests of the students. It is clear that India is disappointing its youth.
Originally published at https://www.mubahisa.in.