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Rajib Ray Elected As DUTA President For Second Term

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Rajib Ray, on Friday, was elected as the president of DUTA for the second term, defeating AK Bhagi by 269 votes.

Rajib Ray was elected as the president of Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA) for the second term, on Friday.

Ray, belonging to Left-affiliated Democratic Teachers’ Front (DTF) defeated right-affiliated National Democratic Teachers’ Front’s (NDTF) candidate AK Bhagi by a margin of 269 votes.

Elections took place on Thursday with a turnout of 82.36 per cent where Ray managed to win 3,750 votes in comparison to Bhagi’s 3,481 votes. 518 votes were found to be invalid, according to officials.

Speaking on his victory, the second time DUTA president said, “It’s a significant win for me and the DUTA because, despite getting little relief in the last two years, teachers have kept faith on the Union.”

Ray elaborated upon the issues faced by teachers of the varsity and laid out his plan for the tenure as he said, “I have to enable all DUTA Executive members, regardless of their political or ideological affiliations, the most confident and conducive ground to fearlessly raise issues and work for teachers.”

“The union and this University owe a lot to the contribution of our colleagues who have been working on a temporary and ad-hoc basis. They deserve to be absorbed in permanent jobs. DU teachers also need time-bound promotions and seniority restored to them. That is non-negotiable. DUTA will put a focused effort in this direction”, he further added.

Further augmenting his vision for the teachers, he said, “Teachers are extremely unhappy with the NEP in its present form. We will continue to put pressure on the Government to be more open-minded about the policy framework and make changes that are genuinely pro-teacher. The educational policy must strengthen the public-funded system rather instead of weakening its foundations.”

Rajib Ray was elected as DUTA president in 2017 as well. The tenure of a president lasts for two years.

 

Featured Image Credits- Democratic Accent

Image Caption- Rajib Ray belongs to left-affiliated Democratic Teachers’ Front (DTF).

 

Shreya Agrawal

shreyaa@dubeat.com

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Campus Central

SFI Allegedly Attacked by ABVP in North Campus

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As the Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) elections come closer, the SFI (Students’ Federation of India) has come out with allegations of being attacked by the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

During the early hours of 26th August, members of the SFI were putting up posters near North Campus’ Vijay Nagar drain. As recalled by eyewitnesses, men in a Scorpio showed up which had posters supporting the ABVP and Sahil Malik, ABVP’s likely presidential candidate for this year. Minutes later, a Swift pulled over and men emerged with hockey sticks and ‘a stick with numerous nails on it’.

The men demanded to the SFI members that they pull the posters down, outnumbered, they obliged. But minutes later, the men attacked the members of SFI.

The three injured activists are Noel, Sumit, and Himanshu. One of them suffered a head injury and the other suffered two fractures in his hands.

DU Beat spoke to Himanshu, who suffered a fracture in his hand. He stated, “We rushed to the hospital in a cab, after that, we went to the Maurice Nagar police station but the case was moved to the Model Town police station.” Himanshu alleges that Sahil Malik was also a part of the gang that attacked him.

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Members of SFI display their wounds at the Protest.
The pictures from the day the incident took place. Image Credits: SFI

Anagha, another eyewitness who escaped the attack recalls the ordeal, “There were a lot of females present so we tried to negotiate to not escalate the situation but as soon as we started removing the posters, the men attacked us. Some of us ran to safety. Sumit is currently hospitalised. Noel has a head injury.”

Members of the SFI gathered at the Faculty of Arts on solidarity with organisations like Krantikari Yuva Sangathan (KYS), Pinjra Tod Collective and All India Students’ Association (AISA). The gathering raised slogans against hooliganism, the culture of violence and the ABVP.  The sloganeering continued as people took turns to speak out against the culture of violence in DU.

Not the first attack.

This isn’t the first alleged attack on the SFI. Previously, multiple allegations of SFI members being attacked in the North Campus lanes have surfaced on social media.

On the 17th of May, members of the SFI were attacked by unidentified men, allegedly from the ABVP. On the same at the Faculty of Arts, Sidharth Yadav, Delhi Secretary of the ABVP refuted the allegations calling them ‘baseless’ and ‘old tactics’.

Earlier this year as well, videos of SFI members being attacked at the Vishwavidyala metro station had emerged.

Do the repeated attacks deter the SFI?

“I will continue with my activism despite the attacks. I don’t think it has deterred any of my comrades; in fact, our numbers have grown. We’ve only been more motivated to fight back. It has fueled us to go forward with our movement.” says Anagha with a hopeful smile.

On the other hand, Monika from the ABVP denied the allegations, she stated “No, as far as our info is concerned none of the ABVP members was involved in the attack. Since, DUSU elections are approaching and ABVP is getting student’s trust and moving in a positive direction. That’s why they are defaming us.”

Sidharth Yadav, the Delhi Secretary of the ABVP was unavailable for comments. Sahil Malik did not respond to DU Beat’s messages.

Feature Image Credits: Jaishree Kumar for DU Beat

Jaishree Kumar

jaishreek@dubeat.com

 

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Admissions 2019

NSUI Plays the Election Bugle- “One University, Equal Opportunities”

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National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) launches its Delhi University Student Union (DUSU) election campaign- “Awaaz Uthao, Seeti Bajao, (to blow the whistle against inequality)” in a press conference on 27th August at the NSUI office in Raisana Road, New Delhi.

The NSUI stated that there is an unbridled inequality at several levels in the University of Delhi (DU) between the students (in terms of caste, religion, gender, etc), campuses, colleges and certain streams (science considered better than arts and commerce) which desists the youth from realising their full potential.

Speaking on the occasion, Neeraj Kundan, National President of the NSUI said that there are several inequalities existing in the DU in terms of campuses and colleges. “There is a major difference between the facilities available in the North Campus and South Campus of the university. Even within the North Campus, there are inequalities between colleges in terms of hostel facilities, different fees structure for same courses.”

Ruchi Gupta, the National In charge of the NSUI talked about the focus of the party’s campaign, “We are going to blow the whistle on inequality in Delhi University, and we are starting this as the beginning of a year-long campaign across the country to highlight unequal educational opportunities and inequality in our society and country.”

The NSUI through its campaign aims to highlight and bring to notice every single occurrence of disparity on campus level, college level and between the students and demand that the University of Delhi fulfils the implicit promise of “One University, Equal Opportunities”.

In the wake of the election season, the campaign aims at being inclusive and promotes equality which might be beneficial for the NSUI.

Feauture Image Credits- Rishabh Gogoi for DU Beat

Abhinandan Kaul

 abhinandan.kaul@gmail.com

 

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Campus Central

Kirori Mal College’s Official Website Hacked

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The website of Kirori Mal College (KMC) was hacked for the second time this year on Sunday, 25th August 2019. Read on to find out more.

Hacking College websites has now become a recurring phenomenon. Almost every year India experiences the hacking of the websites of educational institutions at a concerning rate. In the past, websites of many institutions like IIT Delhi, IIT Madras, IIT Kharagpur, Jamia Malia Islamia, and Aligarh Muslim University have been hacked.

This time yet again, the official website of Kirori Mal College was targeted, which was dismaying for the portal committee and the administration of the college.

The website was defaced by messages like “Hacked by Dark Knight” and “we all stand for the secular and liberal ideology of DU”, calling out the members of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) for how they may “forcefully install Sarvakar’s bust in the campus but cannot bring it into our hearts”. It further said how deeply painful it is to see the way the Delhi University Students’ Union elections take place and asked the student fraternity to rise against corruption and violence, accusing political parties of bribing college students with “movie tickets” in exchange for votes.

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Image Caption: A hacker by the name of Dark_Knight hacked KMC’s Website Image Credits: Aashish Jain

According to Atithi, a student from KMC, “The college website getting hacked twice in a row is a matter of concern for the college administration as it shows a lack of vigilance and carelessness on their part. It affects us too. A lot of valuable information and other data is uploaded on the website, the credibility of which will be questioned; appropriate and quick action needs to be taken so that such things are not repeated in future”

Anujriti Painuli, another student from the College, stated, “The Dark Knight named hacker who got into the website proved the inefficiency of website, which is not up to the mark for such a reputed college.” She also added that the person has particularly targeted the ruling party, accusing them of being biased towards a single community

Students strongly believe that this act of outrageous and irrational behavior is purely a manifestation of unhealthy competition on political grounds. This is a sensitive time for the College website since the process of admission is going on with cut-offs still being released and the new students refer to the website for information regarding time tables and societies.

Feature Image Credits: Shiksha

Avni Dhawan

avnidhawan09@gmail.com

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Arts & Culture

Raising children with no religion: a parental ideology

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Parents of two daughters narrating as why it was so imperative to raise their children with no religious beliefs is a tale that lights a new perspective of secularity and dharma.

 

In today’s time where national politics has boiled down to religion. It became important for me to ask my parents why they raised me and my sister with no religious faith. And here is there answer in my parents’ words

 

‘People often mistake our choice of upbringing our children as our unawareness about our religion, other religions and spirituality in general. However, it was only truly understanding teachings of holy books, the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Quran, the Bible and others that we came to this conclusion that our children will follow no particular religion.

 

If someone actually takes the time to understand these texts, he/she will realize that the end goal or the preaching of each book is the same. It states very evidently that all of us are a small part of larger conscious and each says that the only path of living is to be dutiful and responsible. If all paths have same ideals and all end goals are same, then why should we pre-impose certain set of rules on our kids and rob them of the choice of finding the path that convinces their individuality. It is the same as saying that our child would be a doctor.

 

In 2001, our first child was born, at that point admiring our daughter both of us decided we will never rob her of her originality as a human. All we will do is give her exposure to all rights and all wrongs associated with each philosophy and religion, then she can make an informed decision of what she believes for herself.

 

The other thing we strongly believed was, once we start belonging to a particular religion or follow a certain thought process, we lose the capability of imbibing the great of other religions and questioning the flaws of ours. When we wanted our daughters to meet people, we wanted them to judge them on their opinions and thoughts, not where they come from and what they follow.

 

The greatness of our nation lies in the fact, that all people from various ideologies can co-exist and celebrate all types of festivals with each other and we wanted our kids to enjoy all spheres of the society.

 

A huge problem we faced was if we had subjected our kids to one particular thought, we would have the risk of them being victims of false propaganda and pseudo-spirituality which is preached often by bearers of these particular religions and our children lacking the exposure would have taken them as the gospel truth.

 

We wanted our children to understand that to respect your community, you need to respects others first because all have the same purpose and teachings, to make sensitive human beings. Our choice also allowed us to interpret their teachings in the way we understood, instead of how they are manifested in society.’

 

My father added, ‘The biggest motivation of teaching no religious ideology to our daughters came when I studied Bhagwat Geeta, a sentence said ‘ek aadmi ka dharma kya hai’, when I analyzed this I got stuck on the word ‘dharma’, I realized this word is used in the context of duty. As in, if you translate this word to the English text, it means duty and not religion. In fact, Hindu sub-texts don’t have a word for religion. In our Sankskriti, religion is nowhere mentioned, only duty is. Duty towards your parents, towards your environment and fellow people. And this definition of dharma is same for every religious ideology. It is not that Hinduism teaches you to take care of your parents, but Sikhism doesn’t. So, religion is just a set of rules to fulfil that dharma. So, if I make my kids dutiful, they won’t need religion. Religion only became an unnecessary word to separate us into smaller groups and propagate politics and is nowhere involved in the personal growth of human beings.’

 

 

‘People often say you will find Moksha and Nirvana through religion and that’s not true at all. They believe that our Geeta says that the following religion rigidly finds you happiness, a saying in Geeta has been translated to ‘tu kam kare ja fal ki chinta mat kar’ means you work and god will give you your prize in next life or when you reach heaven. It actually means that when you do a good deed, you instantly feel happiness. and when you hurt someone, you feel guilty.

It also paves the way to think that humans in their intrinsic fabric have a moral compass, then you don’t need religion or set of rules to fulfil your dharma.

 

Religion has no role in personal development, otherwise people wouldn’t kill each other for religion. It is a means of highlighting festivals to move economy or have a system for society.

 

We wanted our children to be rationalists, for them to always have the capability of asking questions. Both of us come from scientific backgrounds and we knew the importance of scientific temperament. It gives you the power of innovation and yet a check on reality. Science is fact-based that gives you concrete knowledge you can build upon, but history has been the witness of so many religious texts becoming irrelevant due to scientific advancements. When Galileo Galilei proved there are moons orbiting Jupiter, it forced the Bible to accept that earth is not the centre of solar system and the universe. These holy texts were written as per the need of the society then. However, they should adapt to the needs of society today. And being part of one religion would’ve halted their personal evolution.

In conclusion, I believe all we wanted was that our children to be kind, dutiful and secular. When we mean secular, we mean they can do whatever they want until they hurt someone else. We don’t mean pro-Hindu or pro-Muslim, just inclusive, pro-choice, pro-people and constitutional citizens. Hence, philosophy and scientific narrative proved to be better tools of upbringing than religion ever did.’

 

Listening to their answer, it made me wonder, is religion the root cause of the bias that we share as a society and does liberal children, hope to solve pressing problems of today. Whatever the answer to those questions be, it is imperative that we have children and youth, free from every bias so they can pave way for a more inclusive, sensitive and better society.

 

Feature Image Credits: Sacred Games (Netflix)

 

Chhavi Bamba

bahmbachhavi@gmail.com

 

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Savarkar Bust Controversy Grows: Protests, Detentions, and Removal

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The controversy behind the installation of the busts of VD Savarkar, Subhas Chandra Bose, and Bhagat Singh in North Campus escalated with protests, detentions and ultimate removal of the statues.

In a press release by the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) today, the student outfit said that the Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) removed the busts of VD Savarkar, Bhagat Singh and Subhas Chandra Bose, which had been installed earlier this week, from the University premises.

It also said that the University administration has given assurance to the ABVP and the DUSU that after the students’ union elections – scheduled for 12th September – the busts will be re-installed as per the necessary procedure. According to the DUSU’s own admission, the busts had initially been installed overnight of their own will, as the administration had allegedly not responded to their requests for months.

Even though the ABVP is currently in power in the Union, the party had maintained that “the busts should be installed in the University of Delhi campus only with the permission of the Delhi University Administration and other concerned authorities.”
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Before the removal of the busts, however, there had been demonstrations and protests by parties opposed to the ABVP. A signature campaign was held Friday by various student organisations, such as Parivartankami Chhatra Sangathan (Pachhas), Pinjra Tod Collective, Krantikari Yuva Sangathan (KYS), Students’ Federation of India (SFI) and others. Sources told us that during the proceedings, the police took action and detained two Pachhas members: Deepak Gupta and Manish Gautam.

A statement made by Pachhas alleged that the police took the biodata of both detainees, who were also told that they would be charged under Section 188 of the Indian Penal Code. The statement then alleged that Deepak Gupta was taken into a separate room, where he was not allowed to sit and not given water. Mr Gupta also alleged that the police tried to “personally attack and humiliate me verbally.” Gupta’s father was allegedly called by the cops, however owing to “bad signal” the call could not be completed. “In a half-hour interrogation, the police tried to intimidate me just because we were peacefully protesting against Savarkar,” the statement further read.

The statement further alleged that during the interrogation, two members of the ABVP, who had been detained for some matter, came into the room. “The strict demeanour of the cops disappeared,” it said. It was also alleged that while Gupta had been made to stand for half an hour, the ABVP members were offered chairs to sit. The statement said that the protests meanwhile kept going at the Arts Faculty Gate. Following the “continued pressure, both members were released after three and a half hours.” However, Gupta says that while the police told them that they were being charged with Section 188, Gautam and he were not given any information about it as they had not received any calls regarding this yet.”

Speaking to DU Beat, Siddarth Yadav, State Secretary, ABVP Delhi, denied the veracity of this chain of proceedings. “It is a good story but none of it is true,” he said. However, he did not respond on time to our further questions regarding what the correct account of proceedings in his view was.

A statement released by ABVP said that the party “demands stringent legal action against those involved from the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) in insulting our freedom fighters” – in response to the NSUI Delhi President Akshay Lakra blackening the bust of Savarkar around 2-2:30 a.m. on 22nd August. “Student organisations associated with left ideology, CYSS and NSUI have stooped down to a very low level and have given a major blow to the culture of debate and discussion prevalent in the university,” it read, saying that the said organisations were “insulting freedom fighters to meet their trivial political interests.”

Akshay Lakra also released a statement which said: “NSUI never wanted to create any hooliganism or nuisance in the campus but we won’t tolerate infiltration of any type of fake nationalism.” He alleged that the “ABVP tried to divert the attention of students of [their] unsuccessful DUSU 2018 tenure including Ankiv Baisoya’s fake degree… this whole statue incident was an attempt to polarise and change the discourse of DUSU elections.”

 

Image Credits –  Pachhas

 

Prateek Pankaj

prateekp@dubeat.com

 

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Delhi NSUI President Files Complaint After Receiving Threatening Phone Calls

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Since the night of the attack on the Savarkar statue, the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) Delhi President, Akshay Lakra, alleges that he has been receiving disturbing phone calls, threatening to attack him if he doesn’t end the protest.

In the aftermath of the Vinayak Damodar Savarkar statue controversy, the drama continues to unfold at the University of Delhi (DU) as the Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) elections inch closer. The illegal installation of the bust saw an immediate reaction from the NSUI, who threatened a mass protest if the bust was not removed within 24 hours. Lakra has now filed an official police complaint addressed to the Deputy Commissioner of Police to look into the threats that he has allegedly been receiving via phone calls.

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This comes after NSUI members led by Lakra attempted to blacken the bust and ornament it with a garland of slippers. In his complaint, he claims that for the past few days he has repeatedly been receiving calls wherein he was subjected to life-threatening statements. The callers have been pressuring him to end his protest against the statue and photos from his Facebook account have been shared widely describing him as a hater of Savarkar. Due to fear for his family and friends, who can be easily identified through his social media accounts, Lakra has deactivated them. He says that he has been getting innumerable calls every second of the day from different states of the country, primarily from Maharashtra. While verifying, he realised that most of the numbers were registered on true caller by the names “Akhand Bharat”, “Hindu Ekta”,” Swaraj Manch”, “BJP supporter” and “Hindu Mahasabha” and even “Narendra Modi” himself.

 

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He also mentioned that the callers have expressed their affiliation and solidarity to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The letter requests the police to take immediate actions against the perpetrators and Lakra has also given all the numbers via which he has been receiving troubling phone calls.

Lakra in the complaint states, “It has been a traumatising experience for me. The ABVP members mentioned should be held responsible for any harm and mishap caused to me.” To support his case, he has provided photographic evidence of several continuous missed calls on his cellphone. While all the other numbers are of Indian users, a number from South Korea and Bahrain has also been giving him calls which he suspects is originating from the accused group.

 

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“People might say that what I did was a political stunt but it is clearly not because I am not running. I just want to start a conversation and have a debate. There is an attempt to impose one particular ideology in the country and to rewrite history. The ABVP has encroached on the property to forcefully install the statue but they have no proof to prove that Savarkar is Veer and no basis to equate him with Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose or Shri Bhagat Singh. I am not afraid of the wrath of the RSS”, he added.
Speaking to DU Beat, Saimon Farooqui, National Secretary, NSUI, said, “RSS & ABVP have always made dishonesty and bigotry as their instruments to cheat the nation and the universities. Earlier they tried to deceive the students by spending INR 22 lakh of the DUSU budget on “tea”. Last year, they deceived the students of the university by approving the candidature for the post of President of DUSU of a person who had fake documents and carried a fake degree. Today they are trying to brainwash the students of the university by trying to prove a bootlicker of the English Government as a freedom fighter and putting him on the same pedestal as Shaheed Bhagat Singh and Subhash Chandra Bose. I’m proud of our Delhi State President Akshay Lakra for this step and the entire NSUI family backs him for this move. If needed, each one of us would come to streets to blacken and remove the statues of thousands of Savarkars like this.”

Additionally, the negative attention that Akshay is receiving has gone well and beyond DU. Popular accounts on Facebook run by elderly men are openly abusing him and threatening him. Shiv Sena leader, Uddhav Thackeray, has also joined the wagon commenting that anyone who insults Savarkar should be beaten openly!

The National Media Convener for the ABVP, Monika Chaudhary, surprisingly, denies any involvement of the ABVP in this matter, and dissociates herself and her party from the scenario. She retorted that the complaint was “completely false” and that the ABVP does not engage with this level of politics. She also stated that none of the numbers mentioned on the complaint could be connected to any ABVP office-bearers. “It is not the actions of an official member of the ABVP. It could have been an ABVP sympathiser or a person who is a big fan of Veer Savarkar,” she said. She also went on to say that this complaint is merely a means to achieve “fame and popularity” for Lakra in light of the upcoming elections.

We are yet to see what steps the Delhi Police will take against the complaint filed. It is also important to note that if true, the scale of backlash being directed at Akshay Lakra is unprecedented and constitutes harassment. It speaks volumes about how students exercising their freedom of speech and action within university spaces are not immune to attacks from the vicious web of internet trollers who rely only on keywords to immediate make insensitive comments.

 

Image Credits: Akshay Larka for NSUI

 

Pragati Thapa

pragatithapa35@gmail.com

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University of Delhi’s SOL students call off Hunger Strike.

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The students from the School of Open Learning (SOL) ended their hunger strike on Thursday after a meeting was proposed by the SOL authorities.

The students and activists of the Krantikari Yuva Sanagathan (KYS) undertook a hunger strike to oppose the implementation of Choice Based Credit System (CBCS), which was to be introduced in SOL in the current academic session. The strike, which commenced on Tuesday, ended as a meeting was proposed by the authorities to resolve these issues.

As reported earlier, the decision to introduce semester system was taken during an emergency meeting of the University’s Executive Council (EC) on Saturday, 17th August 2019, but four members recorded their dissent to the idea.

Akansha, a B.Com student from SOL said, “Government ne article 370 hataane se pehle nahi pucha SOL kya cheez hai? (Government did not ask before scrapping article 370, what is SOL compared to that?)

In 2015, DU had decided to drop annual examinations and paved way for the semester examinations for all its regular colleges under CBCS. However, SOL was exempted since there were no regular classes for these students. The students only had a single examination in May as opposed to two exams during the months of November and May. The latest decision would bring SOL at par with regular colleges.

This decision faced a lot of backlash from the students as it was implemented in haste and the material of the annual mode of exam had already been distributed. Until a few days ago, students of were studying the same annual mode syllabus.

As reported by Outlook India, on Thursday, the students attempted to return their academic books but they were refused by the SOL authorities. Subsequently, in protest, they dumped their materials outside the SOL building, which lead to the management of SOL calling a meeting with the delegates.

Feature Image Credits: Niharika Dabral for DU Beat

Stephen Mathew

Stephenm@dubeat.com

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Pinjra Tod Opposes Police Visits and Inquiries About Kashmiri Students

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In the wake of alleged incidents of the Delhi police visiting college hostels and PGs, and inquiring about Kashmiri residents, Pinjra Tod has written to the Commissioner of Police, Amulya Patnaik, opposing such visits.

Pinjra Tod, an autonomous collective to ensure secure, affordable, and non-discriminatory accommodation for women students across Delhi, has written a letter to the Patnaik alleging that “the Delhi Police has been going college to college, PG to PG in the neighbourhoods of Delhi, trying to identify and mark Kashmiri women students over the past few days.”

Citing an alleged incident, the collective shared that the police went straight to the warden of Miranda House College to collect the list of the names of Kashmiris, and their local and permanent residences. It was only after the intervention of the college Principal that the police returned.

“It would be better if they issued warning to Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs)/hotels indulging in harassment of Kashmiri people instead of surveilling them”, said Pinjra Tod, describing another occurrence which reportedly took place in Jamia Nagar, where the police went to residential colonies, inquiring if women students and working professional staying there were from Jammu and Kashmir.

The collective accused that these visits made in the name of “students’ own protection” has on the contrary, “made people feel threatened and exposed in times when Kashmiri students are already facing public hostility from many corners.”

Pinjra Tod has also said that such “visits have been made in hostels and colleges across the University of Delhi and even off-campus residential areas around Jamia Milia Islamia.”

Linking these visits to the recent abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A by the centre and expressing their opposition towards the same, they said, “A mass hysteria around the triumph of Kashmir has been mobilised to polarize the country, unleashing the most Islamophobic, misogynistic, and genocidal impulses in our society” and these police visits and enquiries have “fueled fears of persecution in an atmosphere where the Indian state has acted against all its own constitutional commitments and past assurances.”

“This intimidation of Kashmiri women students has not stopped with the submission of our letter. Two days ago, Delhi police approached the Indraprastha College authorities and demanded information on Kashmiri students who lived in the hostel. In a context when Kashmiri students are being targeted, harassed and evicted out of houses, these steps taken by the Delhi Police only adds to their sense of insecurity on campus and leads to further targeting,” said Diya Davis, a member of Pinjra Tod.

They have demanded the police to be more “receptive and quick to act on any instances of harassment being reported by Kashmiri students, by landlords, neighbours and others.”

It is to be noted that on 5th August, on the day of the scrapping of the special status granted to Kashmir, Patnaik had issued directions for enhancing police presence in vulnerable areas and places frequented by Kashmiri people such as university campuses and markets in the national capital.

“Enhanced police presence will inspire confidence among the Kashmiri residents,” a senior official had said.

The veracity of the occurrences is yet to be ascertained.

 

Feature Image Credits: Pinjra Tod

 

Shreya Agrawal

shreyaa@dubeat.com

 

 

 

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AISA Protests for Affordable Public Transport; Clashes with ABVP Disrupt the March

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The march took a political and violent turn when the party reached Kirori Mal College (KMC) where the Akhil Bhartiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP), campaigning for upcoming Delhi University Students’ Association (DUSU) elections, clashed with them. 

The All India Students’ Association (AISA), on 23rd August 2019, held a protest at the University of Delhi’s (DU) North Campus. They were pressing for a higher frequency of busses, concessional metro passes for students, and more affordable public transport.

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The protest was interrupted when AISA reached KMC where the ABVP, then campaigning for upcoming the DUSU elections, clashed with them.

The rivalry was very evident as slogans were chanted from both the parties against each other. “Vande Matram”, “Sachin ke goons” and “Cheen ke dalalo ko ek dhakka aur do” (Give the Chinese brokers one more push) were loudly spoken by the members of ABVP against AISA that led to this confrontation.

The brawl became violent and security personnel had to intervene to keep both the parties separate to prevent injuries.

This also put a halt to AISA touring the entire college and they were forced out of the main gate of KMC.

Madhurima, DU Secretary, AISA, describing the confrontation, said, “Our issues are very simple, it is affordable public transport to curb air pollution still they have a problem with that. When we entered KMC, the ABVP was already present in huge numbers. Moreover, they were not even DU students, but outsiders. They then began with their slogan-chanting and slagging, and attacking our activists.”

She added, “The police were also pro-ABVP and even closed the gates of Hansraj to prevent us from entering. We should all realise that it is a big nexus of ABVP, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Government, oil corporations, car companies, and corporates that profit greatly by people not using public transport.”

Kawalpreet Kaur, Delhi President, AISA in conversation with DU Beat said, “DU students have been demanding metro concession passes for a long time now, and how Delhi is facing severe air pollution makes way for public transport to be invested in. There are many cities that are providing free public transport. And with metro fares rising continuously, we see people being discouraged to use them. Earlier, we protested for applicability of student bus pass in AC buses. Sadly, even though the pass is applicable, there is an acute shortage of Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) buses.”

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She also added, “AISA is a common student-based association. What affects the students, affects us. So, we know how terrible it is when you miss your classes due to the less frequent plying of busses. This works against accessibility to education.”

Shreya, a member of the AISA, said, “The main aim for this march today is to propagate two issues: to make public transport very affordable for students and to make Delhi less polluted in retrospect, and for the DUSU elections to focus more on student-centric and environmental issues, rather than caste, religion, and nationalism.”

Two years back when the metro fare was increased, it directly affected the student community. Since then, AISA has been protesting against the same. Last year, they protested in front of Delhi’s Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal’s house, and Prime Minister’s Office for applicability of student bus-pass in red AC buses, and metro concessional pass for students.

They have chosen to protest just before the upcoming DUSU elections, 2019, so the candidates include student-centric environmental and welfare issues in their manifestos which are often ignored.

High deployment of security personnel was seen accompanying the march as it began to prevent riots and control the raging crowd. AISA took their march into corridors of Ramjas College chanting their demands and gather more students.

Witnessing the heat between the two parties, AISA was not allowed to enter the Hansraj College premises.

Kawalpreet Kaur, stating the true aim of these protests said, “We are protesting to pressurise all governments, student associations, and candidates contesting in DUSU election to bring issues like this in light than fighting over statues. The people who have the power to resolve these issues are silent.”

 

Image credits: Noihirit for DU Beat.

 

Chhavi Bahmba

bahmbachhavi@gmail.com

 

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