FREE TO DISAGREE
A CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE TURNS INTO A HOTBED OF DISSENT AS JADAVPUR UNIVERSITY STUDENTS AND FACULTY RESIST GOVERNMENT ATTEMPTS TO MUZZLE ITS AUTONOMY
It was born a child of rebellion. And for over a century, it has maintained that spirit. Not so long ago, a fleeting glance through an 8B bus window would offer a glimpse of tall trees, still sap-green ponds, a little footbridge and gaggles of students going about their day. A picture of college life idyll. Today, you may spot posters declaring: “We debate. We dissent. We unite against oppression. We are JU.” Tune in and you may just hear the protest music floating through the campus air: “Amra noi gerua laal, sabuj kimba saada-neel…Kolorob hok (We are not saffron, red, green or white-andblue…. Let there be noise).”
Jadavpur University (JU) in Kolkata is once again in the eye of a storm. In
confrontation mode with Mamata Banerjee’s ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) government since 2014, the university has now received a body-blow: the state government and the Governor of West Bengal, Keshari Nath Tripathi (who also happens to be the Chancellor of JU), have introduced a new clause in the statute of the university. It states that teachers and staff who speak against the policies of the institution and the government will be hauled up, face departmental probe and run the risk of being dismissed. Students and research scholars will also be under the scanner of a ‘welfare officer’ on ‘morality and ethics’.
August 16. JU. The classrooms are empty. Teachers and students stand near the administrative building, hand-in-hand, forming a human chain. A student steps forward, takes out a lighter and lets the flame lick a sheaf of paper—the ‘draconian’ circular—amid loud cheer. Others followed suit. Burnt shreds of paper scatter across the rain-drenched ground to be trampled by wet shoes. A burial of sorts. Slogans rend the air: “Kaala kanoon kabor jak, kabor jak (Black law, bury it)!”
Outside the campus, groups of students snake through the city in a massive procession—placards, posters, bandanas and T-shirts spray-painted with eye-catching graffiti, “Poshak noi, rumal (Not clothes, handkerchieves)”—bringing traffic in busy south Kolkata to a halt. They are up in arms against the disparaging comments a state minister made about the high hemlines of JU’s women students.
Politics of Pinpricks It’s the ‘pinprick approach’, a new tactic adopted by the state government, which has raised the hackles of the academic community. August has been full of pinpricks, starting with the amended statute of August 9. On August 13, state panchayat and rural development minister Subrata Mukherjee said at a public forum: “Sometimes I think that these universities (Jadavpur and Presidency) should be kept closed for at least three years.” On August 15, he pointed a finger at the “handkerchiefsized” dresses women students of the two universities apparently wore: “Would you like your sister to wear such short, revealing dresses?”
The question is, could these repeated pinpricks have come without Mamata Banerjee’s endorsement? “She cannot tolerate opposing voices and whoever tries to speak against the government, be it an innocent farmer or a college student, is pulled up,” says O.P. Mishra, professor of international relations at JU. For most, changes in the statute point to a larger problem. “The reality is the effort by political agencies and the government to control academic freedom,” says Gautam Gupta, professor of economics at JU. “We are told that similar moves are afoot in central institutes, where teachers are made to sign affidavits that they won’t say or do anything that goes against the government.” The question of appointing a ‘welfare officer’ as a moral guardian has angered many. “What is the definition of morality and ethics and who is setting the standards?” asks Geetashree Sarkar, a department of Bengali student and SFI union leader, who in 2014 had refused to accept her gold medal from the chancellor. “In the present context, deans are nothing but political appointees.” It is pertinent that welfare officers operate under deans.
Since 2011-12, when the TMC overturned 34 years of Left rule, one of its principal tasks has been to remove sympathisers of the earlier Left Front government from key positions. The Jadavpur University Act, 1981, has been revised in the state assembly three times, doing away with representation from university officers, non-teaching staff and students in the highest executive and decisionmaking bodies. “Instead, the government is relying on ex-officio nominated members,” says All-Bengal University Teachers’ Association (ABUTA) president Tarun Naskar, who is also an MLA of the Socialist Unity Centre of India (SUCI) party.
The other major change the TMC government brought in was in the composition of the panel of nominees for the post of V-C. The UGC provision of having its nominee as a contender for the top post was dropped and a nominee of the state higher education department was introduced. “But the most glaring instance of politicisation was curbing the power of the Chancellor—from [being empowered to have] a nominee of his own preference for the post of V-C,” says Partha Pratim Biswas,
JU IS INCENSED THAT THE GOVERNMENT HAS TAKEN OVER THE RIGHT TO NAME V-C NOMINEES AND PUT STUDENTS UNDER A SORT OF MORALITY WATCH
professor of engineering at JU, “the Chancellor is now allowed to select his nominee only in consultation with the state government.”
Changes were also introduced in the selection of deans for the arts, science, engineering and inter-disciplinary faculties. “Deans were earlier elected by teachers,” says ABUTA convenor Gautam Maity. Now they are chosen by a search committee, consisting of a nominee of the government, the Chancellor and the V-C. From framing the syllabus, curriculum, recruitment of teachers and even daily activities, the government has a finger in every pie today. “What it is trying to do is muzzle free thinking by introducing a prisoner’s code,” says Maity.
Through all this, the ruling party’s agenda has been to rein in students. But it’s not even the TMC alone that has issues with JU students. “When a Vivek Agnihotri wants to screen his Buddha in a Traffic Jam, JU students call it an attempt at saffronisation,” says Bengal BJP vice-president, Jai Prakash Majumdar, who was Chhatra Parishad president in JU in 1978. “But when former Naxalite Azizul Haque enters the campus and gives a speech, not an eyebrow is raised. Students call him dada.”
Different in their political hues, but united in their purpose of controlling JU and its students, all political parties have in recent years tried to paint the university as a den of political turmoil rather than as a seat of excellence. “There is a conscious effort on the government’s part to keep JU and Presidency in the headlines for all the wrong reasons...discounting what they stand for—excellence,” says computer science professor and JUTA joint secretary Nandini Mukherjee.
That said, students too have not backed down, booing Mamata and her brigade, waving black flags, shouting “go back” slogans and criticising the government and its policies. “The cry of ‘hok kolorob’ in 2014 was for the removal of a V-C who was undemocratically foisted on us,” says professor of English and JUTA member Nilanjana Gupta. For four months after September 2014, Mamata avoided stepping into the campus as public outrage spread against her government. “Even though the TMC is comfortably perched in the state and has managed to make deep inroads into college politics, capturing JU is still a distant cry,” says Maity. “It’s this realisation that is making it vengeful.”
An Approaching Storm As a storm brews over the draft statute, both the chancellor and state education minister Partha Chatterjee have been busy dissociating themselves from the issue. Governor Tripathi told reporters on August 12: “The statutes were merely suggestions of the government; whether or not they are accepted depends on the university.” On the same day, Chatterjee said: “We’re not into such things, it was done by some committee. Let the university decide, then we’ll take a final call.”
“It’s nothing new,” says ABUTA’s Naskar, “they are waiting for the storm to blow over.” Both JUTA and ABUTA maintain that the governor is hand in glove with the ruling party and that they have consciously introduced the clauses to divide the staff. “The university’s executive council, in all possibility, will delete such a clause and send the statute for the Chancellor’s consideration. He and the government have the ultimate power to decide on this, and arbitrarily at that. That is what they have been doing consistently,” he says.
On the campus, it feels like the lull before a storm. As evening falls, students catch up on the events of the day. They sit around in groups, in the college canteens, on the steps, on the grounds and just about anywhere, debating, over endless cups of tea, morality, ethics and the riddle of life and the universe. Another picture of college life idyll. A group of girls gathers for a selfie near Milanda’s tea corner, breaking into peals of laughter: “Is this within the permissible limits of morality?” In answer, they flash the V-sign. Impromptu slogans break out in the corner—“JU is education, JU is free, JU is liberation, Chhi chhi Vichhi (shame shame V-C)”—resonating through the clear evening air.