The Idea of JNU and the RSS jingoism
Ish Mishra
Being in the headlines of media and social
media, globally, since its premeditated invasion by Police in search of “anti-national”
students accompanied by venomous campaign against it by Hindutva right wing
extremists on 11th February 2016, JNU seems to have transcended to
abstract noun –the Idea – from the common noun – the institution. It certainly
is an idea – an idea of democratic academic culture that enables the students
to scientifically comprehend the reality, articulate it and logically express
it. This ability comes through well-established conventions of debates,
discussions and discourse; seminars, conventions and round-the-clock library
socialization; post dinner talks etc. JNU is an idea of a progressive pedagogy
that facilitates a system of knowledge process through unceasing dialectical
questioning anything and everything including God or Karl Marx, beginning with
one’s own mind set. JNU students in unceasing quest of knowledge know that key
to any knowledge is unceasing questioning. JNU is an idea of a democratic
political culture through public meetings, film screening, theatre and other
cultural performances, recitation, heated and not so heated academic, cultural
and social debates in Dhaba Addebajis (discussion sessions at tea joints);
round the clock library socialization and midnight strolls. Here night life is as
integral part of the learning process as day life, a desirable attribute for
all the campuses. That is why JNU is an Idea.
This Idea is unfertile for the manufacture of
devotion and blind faith, the lifeline of the obscurantist organizations like
RSS. That is why it has been subject of wrath of RSS ideologues since beginning.
It’s becoming hub of movement for justice to Rohith Vemula proved to be the
triggering point of accumulated hostility. The government made a premeditated invasion of
the campus in connivance with IB, ABVP and fraud channels that telecasted the
doctored videos of so-called anti-national sloganeering. Bereft of ideas, all
the RSS men, including the PM, are repeating the Goebbelsian lies putting the
Bharat ki Barbadi slogans in the mouth of students, who would sacrifice
themselves for making India beautiful and defend the constitution from the
attacks of right wing extremism.
Most of us spent our childhood fondly
chanting the slogans of Bandemiatram and Bharat Mata ki Jay. But
suddenly these slogans have become scary since ABVP and other RSS brigades made
it a war cry to attack minorities, Dalits, rationalists and now students. The
tactic of the hurt religious sentiments is now replaced by the tactic of hurt
nationalist sentiments. Referring to JNU issue in the National Executive
meeting of BJP, the Prime Minister Modi said that dissent is allowed not on the
cost of breaking the country and that nationalism is chanting Bharat Mata ki
Jay. Contrary to Nehru’s conception of Bharat
Mata as the country and people, RSS depiction is in the form of a Goddess
holding saffron flag in one hand and Trishul in the other. According to
him, not chanting this slogan is insult to the constitution. Nowhere in the
constitution is written anything about nationalism or Bharat Mata.
Forcing anyone to chant a particular slogan in violation of his fundamental
right to freedom of thought, conscience, faith and belief is insult to
constitution. Assertions of being a Hindu nationalist, by RSS loyalists including
thepersons of PM’s stature, is violation of the preamble of the Constitution
that envisages a secular democratic state and thereby insult to constitution.
Had Modi tried to expand his knowledge of politics by reading political
history, he should have known that nationalism in a constitutional democracy,
as aptly put forth by the eminent historian, Eric Hobsbawm, is allegiance to
constitution and not chanting or not chanting a particular slogan. Disruption of the meetings of ideological
opponents with the war cries of Bharat Mata Ki Jay is obstructing to
constitutional rights of freedom to expression and assembly is hooliganism and
contempt to constitution. JNU’s response to hooliganism is argument.
Arun Jaitely recently
claimed that the ABVP has won the ideological war in JNU, may be as a damage control of
worldwide condemnation of Police invasion of JNU campus and aggressive hate
campaign by RSS and its affiliates. One can only laugh at such statements
coming from supposedly Number Two in Modi Government. Reading the statements
and reactions of BJP leaders including the PM Modi on JNU issue, least to say
about the chums like Venkaiya Naidu who considers Modi to be a gift of God to
the country, one can’t help concluding that the BJP is a bunch of liars and
jokers. It has been well established that the doctored tapes were telecast by
the fraud channels; all of them have been repeating the lies. The BJP President has called upon the BJP
workers to “focus on the JNU thought battle”. But hooliganism, abuses,
disruption of other’s program is probably the RSS invented new definition of
“thought battle”. Undeterred by fascist state repression, ABVP hooliganism and
aggressive Goebbelsian campaign with undefined jargon of anti-nationalism, JNU community,
the students, teachers and old JNUites across the generations seem to be
determined to transform the struggle for justice for Rohith Vemula and JNU into
a wider struggle against government’s fascist tactic to suppress the
dissent and in defense of the democracy and constitution.
Yes, Mr. Modi, Mr. Jaitley, Mr. Shah, it’s an
ideological war, war between the ideology of ideas and ideology of doctored
videos and premeditated propaganda; between the ideology of reason and that of
hooliganism; the ideological war between the idea of JNU and the jingoism of
Hindutva extremism. JNU is an Idea and Idea cannot be marauded by brute force,
Idea moves on to create history. Repression and jail has strengthened the
conviction. Why had Mr. Jaitley to make this proclamation of ideological war? Kanhaiya’s March 3, electrified speech received
massive acclaim from media and social media. May be, Jaitley and Shah, wish to
keep the morale of their demoralized devotees. Kanhaiya’s speeches, for that
matter, speeches and writings of other activists, are so mature in
comprehension, articulation and emphatic in assertions of commitment to
country’s constitution and conviction to defend it from right wing fascist
attack. According to BBC news few days back, Kanhaiya’s speech after release
from the jail was shared by over 30 lakhs people on Facebook and liked by
millions. Speeches of my very dear young comrades, Umar, Anirban were equally
reassuring for the legacy of JNU.
RSS
Jingoism wants to scare JNU into silence, but, as after coming out of jail, the
budding historian, Umar aptly said, living under fear has never been an option
for the idea of JNU. In contrast to the static jingoism that unable to invent
new slogans has been ranting the same clichéd slogans since its inception; the
Idea is dynamic with its own laws of motion, with new slogans and cannot be
terrorized into inaction. Yes Mr. Jaitley, this is a cultural and intellectual
war between Idea and jingoism, between Brahmanical obscurantism and
egalitarianism as dreamt by Marx and Ambedkar. And in this ideological war between
the Idea of JNU and RSS jingoism, eventually the Idea shall be victorious. .
The
Idea of JNU
Indeed, JNU is an Idea, the idea of struggle
against injustices, to be imbibed by the youth of the country the new
protagonists of the history, in order to properly paly their role at this
historic juncture, when the democratic ideas and institutions are under fascist
attack, on the pattern of Nazi Germany under the disguise of ultra-nationalism.
Few videos doing rounds on social media, showing anti-JNU brigade chanting
Bharat Mata ki Jay amidst abuses to Matas of Kanhaiya in filthiest language, is
probably the thought battle of Shah and ideological war of Jaitley. In fact,
the Shakha training of devotion blunts the faculties of reason and aptitude of
dissent. This is my experienced reality. JNU’s response is alternative classes
on nationalism and imaginative cultural programs. This is the idea of JNU.
JNU’s response to Rajnath’s lies; Modi’s
claim of concocted nationalism; Arun Jaitley’s war cries is the article of an
MPhil student of JNU, Aprajitha Raja, Where
even the Walls speak. (Indian Express, March 9, 2016). To quote, “No university can be a place of learning if questioning is
disallowed, if criticality and rationality are disallowed. JNU is not its
buildings, labs and computers. It is made of its students, teachers and
karamcharis, the dialogue between them, the pedagogic practices evolved by
them. It is our practice of progressive debate and discussion that has, to an
extent, institutionalized gender and social justice” Leaving aside
Kanhaiya’s speech or for that matter speeches of Umar, Anirban, intelligent and
daring handling of the movement by JNUSU Vice President, Shehla Rashid and
other young comrades or writings of greats like Noam Chomsky and others, this
article alone, weighs heavier over the rantings of the entire RSS think tanks,
who have been just repeating the lies of slogans and linking it to the death of
a soldier in an avalanche at Himalayan heights, as if the 9th
February 2016 cultural program in JNU caused the tragedy. JNU’s response to these slanders is factual
argument with logical analyses. This is the Idea of JNU.
We, the first decade JNUites, feel proud to
be part of the formation of this Idea and firmly stand with it. On a Facebook
group, The First Decade JNUites, baring couple of exceptions, the entire
group – left, right and center – who would, during our JNU days, fiercely
contest each other from public platforms and jointly do intellectual/cultural/literary
Addebaji at Ganga/Godavri Dhaba, solidly stand with this Idea. The contest
would be between ideas, not between the individuals. This is JNU legacy. The right wing
extremists, unable to comprehend the importance of this Idea want to destroy
this legacy. But this is the legacy of ideas and ideas do not die but move on
through generations and create history.
JNU response to state oppression, ,communal propaganda and jingoism is
3.5 KM long human chain; the non-violent march of 15,000 people from across the
generations of JNUites with innovative slogans and songs; alternative daily
classes on Nationalism, calmly attended by 4,000-5,000 students, unheard of in
the history. A JNUite never becomes ex-JNUite but remains a JNUite all her/his
life. This is the idea of JNU.
I initially began to write this article on
15th February, 2016, but reminded of Lenin’s postscript of State
and Revolution that participating in revolution is more pleasant than
writing about it, postponed it to participate in the longest human chain in the
history of JNU and most probably of Delhi. Ever since so much has happened in
the ongoing war between ideas and orthodoxy; between JNU and jingoism. People
from world over are writing and talking about and protesting against the Modi
government’s saffron invasion of campuses, with the RSS student wing, ABVP
acting as its para-military force on the lines of Nazi storm troopers (SA),
whose primary task was to break/disrupt the meetings of opposition parties,
particularly communists and terrorize the minorities with hooliganism and
sustained hate campaign with jingoistic slogans of national chauvinism. On 15th
March,
there was yet another huge protest march to Parliament demanding the release of
Umar Khalid and Anirban, now released on bail. In the meeting, at the
conclusion of the march, the jingoist goons once again abused and tried to
attack Kanhaiya, the JNUSU President, who responded with well-articulated
challenges to Modi government and RSS and conviction to politically fight the
fascist attack on education and democracy with reiteration of allegiance to
constitution and resolve to defend it. His and other students’ leaders speeches
based on facts and logical arguments manifested their revolutionary conviction
and commitment towards the motherland in Nehruvian sense defined in terms of
the people. JNU’s response to muscle
power and abuses is logical arguments based on facts. This is the idea of JNU.
15th February 2016, shall remain a
memorable day in our lives and also in the history of JNU. The moral and
political pleasure of being part of over 3.5 KM human chain with old and new
comrades was beyond description. The disciplined march to the Admin Blok holding
innovative banners and posters, singing new songs, raising new slogans, filled
in us, who dreamed the decade of 1970s as the decade of emancipation, a new
hope and optimism, in the dark days of undeclared emergency. Listening to young
scholar addressing to a peaceful gathering of approximately 7,000-8,000 with
such maturity, scientific comprehension, commitment and clarity, overwhelmed us
made us feel proud of the JNU legacy. The Stand with JNU march on 18th
February has been the largest rally in my memory of about 4 decades after the Citizen’s
March against Babari Masjid demolition in December, 1992. It reassured me about the authenticity of my
oft-repeated dialogues, “The engine of history does not have the reverse gear,
there may be some temporary U turns” and
“Every next generation is, in general, always smarter” that sooner or
later reverses the U turn and give it direction. This is the idea of JNU.
Amidst the protracted Occupy UGC protest,
Rohith Vemula’s institutionally abated martyrdom made JNU the hub of struggle
for justice to Rohith with twin slogans of JAY BHIM and LAL SALAM symbolizing
the unity between struggles of social and economic justices. Unlike most of the
other universities, JNU students and teachers do not confine their concerns to
campus issues, but their concern extends to all the major issues of the society
and the planet. That takes me along the memory lane around 38 years back to the
period of Janta Party regime in late seventies. We, the JNU students under the
leadership of JNUSU, had a successful protracted struggle against DTC fare hike,
in the campus as well as at Boat Club. DTC buses were the major mode of
transport. There were teargassing, lathicharges and detentions. Against all the
provocations and actions by the state we remained peaceful and persistent. Many
students had fractured their limbs. I remember our joking about the plaster on
leg of Ritu Jairath (Now a professor at JNU’s Centre for Russian Studies) that
so much literature would be lost after its removal. In the end, we succeeded in
getting the fare hike rolled back in Toto. It remains the only instance in my
memory of total rollback of hiked fare. A
student from Delhi University that, unfortunately, has no history of any
radical student
movement under the Students Union leadership, asked us that when we can travel
all over Delhi on a Rs.12.50 student DTC pass, why were we taking so much pain?
Our answer was that population of the world is more than one, as, contrary to
the epochal ideology, individuals do not exist as self-seeking individuals in
isolation but in and through a society under certain social relationship with
fellow individuals, which, as Marx has said, they enter into independent of
their conscious will? We seek to break these exploitative, inhuman relations of
domination and subjugation for the emancipation of humanity. We don’t struggle
only on the issue of mess bill but also against the despotism of Shah of Iran
and armed presence of Soviet Union in Afghanistan. This is the idea of JNU.
This was a pleasantly different experience of
agitation than those of Allahabad University where I studied before
coincidently reaching JNU to explore possibilities of underground existence
during the latter half of the emergency. The students’ protest rallies in AU
and other universities, invariably meant brick batting, vandalism, looting of
shops, damaging vehicles and other public/private property. We kidnapped few
DTC buses to the old campus and couple of senior people offered themselves, to
guard the them from any outside miscreants or infiltrators. With due respect to
them, the conductors and drivers were taken to canteen and treated them with
tea, samosa, cigarettes and conversation. This is the idea of JNU.
I may go on and on with nostalgic memories of
the Idea of the JNU internalized during around a decade’s stay on the campus. I
would conclude this section with the unique character of JNUSU, its
constitution and the elections. A student of Lucknow University visiting JNU
during election time in late 1970s was mesmerized to witness the election
meetings, where students were taking notes of the speeches. After the meeting
he jokingly had commented that in JNU any student can contest the election, as
apart from wining or loosing there is no risk to life. Yes, flouting of
money/muscle power is a democratic taboo. Disputes are not decided by muscle
power but by students’ General Body Meetings (GBMs) after comprehensive
deliberations. The present JNUSU Constitution taken upon them by “We the
students of JNU” in a GBM turned Constituent Assembly, in 1978, is a unique
document. The document prepared by the drafting committee after prolonged,
incisive deliberations, was extensively discussed and debated in the GBM of
each Centre and then at of each School; in the GBMs of each hostel. The
drafting committee then prepared the final draft incorporating the agreed
amendments that was extensively deliberated in the UGBM, which adopted it by
turning itself into a Constituent Assembly. It envisages no role or control of
state or university administration in the elections of JNUSU. This is the Idea
of JNU.
Elections are conducted by an Election
Commission, school wise elected by the students. These elected election commissioners elect a
Chief Election Commissioner. Any evidence of use of muscle/money power noticed
by the Commission would automatically lead to disqualification of the
candidature. Campaign would be through hand written posters, photocopied
(earlier cyclostyled) thematic leaflets and election meetings. The intervention
of Police or university establishment is strictly undesirable. There have been
no cases of violence in its history of four and half a decade barring the
exception of certain instances of hooliganism by ABVP in the near past.
Election season in JNU is like the season of a democratic festival. On the
election nights, almost entire JNU is awake, awaiting declarations of results
after each phase of counting. The enthralling
memories of those nights, sitting in groups across the organizations, singing,
chatting, gossiping, cracking jokes with tea and cigarettes, seem fresh. There
would be no malice or bitterness between the winning and losing candidates or
their supporters as political differences do not transcend into socio-personal.
This is the Idea of JNU.
The
Jingoism of RSS
This dialectical, democratic ambience of
question and dissent is unconducive for the manufacture of sense of devotion
and unconditional faith and following, the lifeline of the jingoist
authoritarianism. The soil of JNU is unfavorable to Brahmanical obscurantism
and pro-imperialist corporatism. (When the ideology of Brahmanism faces the
danger to its existence, camouflages itself as Hindutva or patriotism.) That is
why it has been subject of rage of all the rightwing extremists – from RSS to
Jamat-e-Islami. The JNU’s response to aggressive slander campaign by Hindutva
brigades and state coercion has been peaceful protests.
In contrast to the Idea of JNU, the jingoism
of right wing extremism represented by the ABVP is hooliganism, violence and
disruption. It seems that owing to the lack of the ideas and imagination,
unable to have its own programs, it disrupts the programs of the opponents
through violence and abuses. Latest is the attempted disruption of JNUSU
President, Kanhaiya Kumar’s meeting in Nagpur, where in a very well attended,
meeting challenged the might of RSS from the vicinity of its head quarter.
Before that the program of a talk in Delhi University on the ‘Life and Works of
Bhagat Singh’ by the eminent scholar on Bhagat Singh, former JNU Professor
Chamanlal was violently disrupted with Bharat Mata Ki jay slogans, with a large
number of Police personnel standing as mute spectators in the same way as it
did in Patiala House attack by saffron goons on JNUSU President, students and
Professors. There seems to be a premeditated pattern. 20-25 ABVP hoodlums shall
disrupt the expression of dissent and the Police instead of rounding them allow
them to go ahead and then would ask the organizers to wind up. It again reminds
the Nazi Storm Troopers (SA) that would break the programs of opponents,
particularly communists and invade the minority hamlets and Police would turn a
blind eye. Here are just few instances.
On 13th March, Nagarik Samaj
led by an early JNUite, Vijay Shankar Chaudhary, organized a seminar JNU
Speaks in Muzaffarpur, Bihar. The booking of the Municipal auditorium, Amrapali, was
cancelled at the last moment by the Municipal commissioner on the behest of a
local BJP leader. The speakers included the well-known scientist, Prabir
Prkayastha; JNU Professor SN Malakar; AIDWA General Secretary, Kavita Krishnan;
noted writer and Calcutta University Professor Jagdishvar Chaturvedi former
JNUSU President and this writer. When the organizers decided to hold the
program in the ground outside the auditorium premises, as has become their
wont, around 20-25 ABVP members attacked the audience with stones and lathis to
disrupt the proceedings. The police remained mute spectator and advised the
organizers to abandon the program. My purpose of this reporting is to indicate
the pattern and to point out the difference between the idea of JNU and the
jingoism of rightwing extremists. It seems that the only program of ABVP is
disrupting others’ programs.
Plight
of the celebrated artist MF Hussain is well known. A group of ABVP members
along with other RSS affiliates vandalize his exhibition, as the self-anointed spokespersons
of the religious feelings of the Hindus that were hurt by his paintings. He was
in a way was forced to leave his beloved homeland, as Bahadurshah Zafar was forced
by the colonial rulers to die in an alien land.
In
2008, a group of 25-30 ABVP members vandalized the History Department of Delhi
University and manhandled a Professor, a historian with a Muslim name, to
protest against inclusion of an essay in Delhi University Syllabus by the noted
historian AK Ramanujan, Three Hundred Ramayana, five examples and Thoughts
on Three Translations. The pretext was the same as in case of protest
against Hussain’s painting, hurting of religious sentiments. Overriding the
recommendation of 3 out of the 4 members of the Committee formed under the
instructions of the Supreme Court and protests by teachers, students and
prominent historians, Delhi University establishment, probably taking 2-3 dozen
hooligans as “We the People” of the Indian Constitution’s preamble, removed the
essay from the course in 2011.
The
theatre group of Khalsa College of Delhi University, Ankur’s performance of a
play on communal riots was disrupted by ABVP and censored by the DUSU led by
it. The authorities instead of handing over the disrupters to Police banned the
play under the pretext of apprehension of law and order problem.
In
the aftermath of Muzaffarnagar communal mayhem in 2013, a group of students
organized a talk on it in the Department of Sociology in Delhi School of
Economics, Delhi University; few ABVP members began shouting clichéd Bande
Matram, even before any speaker had uttered a single word. Their objection is
not about what is being said but why is being said?
The
screening of Muaffarpur Baki Hai, in Kirorimal College was disrupted in
the same fashion by ABVP members, who abused and threatened a senior Professor
of English literature and theatre personality, Keval Varma. College
authorities, instead of handing over the trouble makers to Police, stopped the
screening.
Rohit
Vemula’s institutional murder is being so widely debated and documented that
needs not further description; we just seek to allude to the pattern and graph
of the Right Wing extremist strategy to attack dissenting views on the campuses
in order to saffronize them with the help of hand-picked Vice Chancellors. The
RSS strategy of evoking religious sentiments by now seems to have exhausted so
it resorted to arouse ‘nationalist’ sentiments with labeling anti-RSS sections
of the society as anti-national. Ambedkar Students Association opposed the
disruption of screening of the Muaffarnagar Baki hai by ABVP leaders. As
is well-known, on the behest of the HRD Minister, 5 Dalit Students were
rusticated from the hostel that forced the aspiring science writer to commit
suicide, leaving behind the only writing, a letter reminding of the last letter
of Bhagat Singh addressed to his comrades.
And
finally came the much awaited invasion of JNU. It reminds
the stage managed fire in the Reichstag (Parliament) by SA and blaming the
Communists, the largest parliamentary opposition party with aggressive,
chauvinistic hate campaign against them and the minorities. But India of 2016
is not the Germany of 1933. The JNU authorities withdrew the permission of a
cultural program A City without Post Office on the complaint of
the ABVP leaders. The organizers went ahead with the program. The reporters of
“nationalist” channels were already present there to aggressively telecast
doctored videos with so-called anti-national slogan and aggressive hate
campaign against JNU as the hub of anti-nationalism.
We are at a historic
junction. It is the beginning of a cultural-intellectual civil war between JNU
and jingoism; between the daring dissent and timidity of conformity; between
beauty of the idea and brutality of the power. On one side are likes of iconic
intellectual Noam Chomsky and the budding scholars like Aprajitha Raja and
likes of Subrahmanyam Swamis and Vaikaiya Naidus on the other; Kanhaiya Kumar symbolizing
the spirit of protest on one side and the goons who attacked him, on the other; jingoist goons who attacked JNUSU President
on the one side and the JNU students who safely escorted the goons to Police
posted at the gate, on the other; the budding
scholars like Umar Khalid, Anirban and the likes on one side and ABVP lumpens
circulating the videos of violent threats to JNU students on the other; in
nutshell supporters of freedom of thought on one side and supporters of the
oppressors of freedom on the other. The pages of today’s newspapers, magazines,
web portals and video clippings shall be the research material for the historians of tomorrow.
JNU
and Jingoism
This
has generated a debate on nationalism and anti-nationalism; right to freedom of
speech and its limits; freedom to cultural celebrations and cultural policing. Every
adversity has some blessings in disguise. To divert the attention from the
folly of development slogan; submission of political sovereignty to WTO; the design
to hand over the education to the global academic mafia; commitment with the
World Bank to include higher education in GATS as a tradable service; shift of
subsidy from the poor to the corporate, the government and RSS fronts resorted
to attack the campuses with accusation of anti-nationalism. Rohith and his ASA
comrades were branded as anti-nationalists and persecuted under the
instructions of the Minister of HRD. Martyrdom of Rohith brought together the
slogans of Jay Bhim and Lal Slam. A long awaited unity of Marxism and Ambedkarism,
the unity of social and economic justice. Attack on JNU., the hub of movement
for justice to Rohith Vemula, became the triggering point of the surging sea of
pain exploding into the surging sea of dissent and protest against the attempts
of commercialization and communalization of higher education. Intellectuals
from world over, including Nobel Laureates like Noam Chomsky and Amartya Sen have
joined the debate by condemning the state action of violating the autonomy of
the university, in solidarity with the Idea of JNU. Lots is being said &written
in solidarity with JNU and also
malicious propaganda against it.
While reading and listening to the leaders,
thinkers, ideologues and social media jokers of the RSS fronts, who circulate
abusive videos of threats to “traitors” of JNU, one wonders at their sense of
reason, rather lack of it to be more precise. Subrahmanyam Swami, the BJP MP,
wants to change the name of the university, as Jawaharlal Nehru was not a
scholar and to be closed for 4 months to purge it from “anti-nationals”. Of
course for Swami and RSS, whose only scholars have been MS Golwalkar and
Deendayal Upadhyay, can’t accord scholarship to Nehru, the only intellectual
prime minister, India had. Apart from Discovery of India and Glimpses
of the World, his An Autobiography is considered to a classic at par
with John Stuart Mill’s The Autobiography. It is to be noted that Golwalkar transported North
Pole to the “region that is today called Bihar and Orissa” and advised Hindus
not to waste energy in fighting against the British and preserve it for
fighting the internal enemies, the Communists and followers of other religions
and to imitate Hitler. (We or Our Nationhood Defined) Deendayal Upadhyay,
in agreement with Golwalkar on Manusmriti, declares it to be the best
and most just law book in the human history. He considers Budhism to be traitor
to “mother religion” and advocates a state based on Dharma. (Integral
Humanism) During BJP rule in UP, the Gorakhpur University has been named
after him. Here we do not wish dissect the ideological texts but just to hint
at the intellectual irrationality of their ideologues, in order to infer the
intellectual level of their followers, indulging into hooliganism in real world
and virtual world of social media. Not only ABVP, as mentioned above, whose
political activity seems to be reduced to disrupting programs of other
organization, ransacking the premises and physical and virtual violence, but
also, despite the proven facts of the forgery of telecasting the doctored videos
by the “nationalist” channels, the ministers, MPs and RSS ideologues too
continue repeating the orchestrated lies about slogans in JNU, in Goebbelsian
fashion, instead of embarking on the channels for the anti-national
misinformation.
The JNU students, daring to question and
dissent with courage to express their commitment and conviction for a better
India and the world free from exploitation and superstitions by their words and
deeds, are charged with sedition under the draconian, colonial law. The same law was used by British rulers
against freedom fighters like Tilak, Gandhi and Bhagat Singh. These students
are the new protagonists of impending revolution in alliance with the
organizations of workers, peasants, Adivasis, Dalits and women. I personally
know most of them, some of them very closely, like Umar Khalid, who had been
one of the most impressive informal students at Delhi School of Economics
Addebaji, during his undergraduate days in Kirorimal College. With all the
sincerity and a teacher’s conscience, I wish to authentically state that these
radical scholars would sacrifice themselves to make India beautiful, free from
miseries; exploitation; inequality and hatred and not ruin the India. That is
why they have been protractedly struggling against the subversion of higher
studies and its saffronization.
Much has happened ever since. The interesting
debate on nationalism, sedition and extent of freedom is ongoing in all the
formats of media. One side are the facts and logical arguments and on other side
are clichéd lies and unsubstantiated vilification. Many insightful articles in
solidarity with the Idea of JNU by celebrities and not-so celebrities have been
magnificent and enlightening. The anti-JNU articles are monotonous ranting the
same lie of “Barat ki Barbadi slogan” and linking it to the tragic death of the
soldier on the difficult Himalayan heights due to avalanche. This has been well
published that the tapes were doctored allegedly by former aid of the HRD
Minister Smriti Irani. It has also been well published that pro-Pakistan
sloganeers were IB implants. One fails to understand how freedom of expression
is related to death of soldier in avalanche. Desperation in the instant
jingoistic reactions of Home and HRD ministers immediately after the Police
action in the campus indicate the planning to have been made at high places of
power.
The Objective Reality
The Manuvadi custodians of Hindutva (read
Brahmanism) know that the historic hegemony of Brahmanical ideology for
thousands years had depended mainly on the basis of monopoly over “knowledge” and
its definition. The universal accessibility of education and state affirmative
actions has drastically changed the composition of the campuses during the 2-3
decades. This engendered Brahmanism. Hence the attempts to
privatize/commercialize and make the reservation policy irrelevant and to
invade the government funded institution with Police in connivance with ABVP
ever since Modi came to power. The saffron fascist, attack that began with the
ban on the Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle with the
accusation of “spreading hatred” against the PM Narendra Modi and “raking up
the caste issue” that was eventually revoked with wide ranging protest and its
condemnation. The government began to appoint RSS minded Directors/Vice
Chancellors with doubtable academic credibility, who in connivance with the RSS
outfits particularly ABVP, started silencing the voices of the dissent. Protest
of FTII appears to be irrepressible. Next it targeted Hyderabad Central
University that culminated into institutional murder of Rohit
Vemula. It led to wide ranging protest with JNU as its hub in conformity with
its historic character. The Modi government through its Home and HRD ministers
in connivance with ABVP and fraud news channels stage-managed the so-called
anti-national sloganeering in the campus in a cultural program, “A City without
Post Office” organized by a group for an excuse to invade it under the pretext
of the so-called sedition, on the pattern stage managed Godhra episode, to
launch unprecedented communal pogrom in 2002 under the “action-reaction” argument.
Attack on JNU as a hub of anti-nationalism
together with Rohith’s institutional murder backfired for Modi government and
has led to an intellectual war on a global label between the Idea of JNU and
the jingoism of RSS between reason and communal fascism. The continued attack
on the democratic ethos of the institutions of higher academics brought
together the fractioned and fractured left students group together with Ambedkarite
groups on the same platform. The onslaught is continuing. Allahabad University
Students’ Union (AUSU) President, Richa Singh who led successful protest
against the notorious BJP MP Adityanath’s program in the Students Union hall, is
being targeted by the pro RSS administration of the University and ABVP. The
BHU vice chancellor, who proudly claims his RSS affiliation, has terminated the
services of Magsaysay award winner, Prof Sandeep Pandey and expelled 6 students
for exposing the deep rooted corruption in the University, with the
announcement that he would not allow BHU to become JNU. Restoration of Appa
Rao, one of the main culprits’ of Rohith’s institutional murder, as HCU VC and
brutal Police attack on the peaceful protest of students and teachers, is clear
indication that Modi government is not going to relent. The students and
professors picked up by Police were abused, insulted and tortured. Undeterred
by repression, the students resistance and struggle for justice to Rohith Vemula
also goes on and cnnot be cowed down. Fascist repression knows no limits and so
does the revolutionary resistance. So, it is going to be a long battle between
repression and resistance, between nexus of Brahmanism and neoliberal
corporatism and the alliance of the forces of social and economic justices. Let
us be prepared for a long battle.
The
Forces of Resistance
The democratic
quality of European Renaissance and reform movements was that it had broken
apart the birth qualification and birth based hierarchal social division but
created new qualifications of wealth. By the 19th century, when Marx
was discovering the laws of the dynamics of the political economy of capitalism,
the basis of social division was only economic or derived from/related to it.
In India, a literary and social movement for social and spiritual equality with
an appeal to rejection of traditional religious social values with emphasis on
social & spiritual equality, which was the central theme of Renaissance,
had begun with Kabir. But for reasons, beyond the scope of this write up, could
not reach its logical conclusion of breaking the birth-based social
inequalities, expressing themselves in the caste system based on the ideology
of Brahmanism. Colonialism, instead of breaking the “Asiatic Mode”, allied with
it and used it to enhance its own interest following the pattern of alliance of
capitalism with feudalism in late capitalist development in Europe. Indian
communists, instead of adapting Marxism as a method to comprehend the objective
realities, adopted it as a model. Though they have been on the forefronts of
struggles against the caste oppressions and euphoria, as the ruling (dominant)
castes have been the ruling class also, but not addressing the caste agenda separately,
was a theoretical and strategic mistake. Caste was and still remains a living
reality. During the anti-Mandal euphoria, when most of teachers who would
otherwise preach depoliticization, had become Dronacharayas to exhort Arjunas
to pick up the Gandiv, it was the leftists of all hues, who were on the other
side. DUTA’s leftist President, MMP Singh was forced to step down as the DUTA
resolution opposing anti-Mandal was defeated.
The JNUSU leftist President Amit Sengupta met the same fate with the
same reasons. But not addressing the caste issue as a separate agenda, was a
not a tactical mistake but theoretical and pf principles. It was left to the
followers of the principles Baba Saheb Ambedkar and other social justice group
to make the issue of Brahmanical ideology as the main political plank. The
dialogue, coordination and unity of leftists and Ambedkarites for an integrated
struggle against social, economic and cultural domination had been long due.
Since domination has various facets, the resistance has to be at various
fronts. Martyrdom of Rohith provided the opportunity of unity in struggle that
has been cemented by JNU episode, as a prelude to theoretical dialogues. The
continuity of the unity of Jay Bhim and Lal Salam and the synthesis of
teachings of Ambedkar and Marx is the need of the hour. There exists a crisis of theory not only in
capitalism but also in socialism. The opportunity must not be lost. As is clear
from the incidents in Hyderabad and JNU, attack on education and democracy is
twofold – cultural and economic. The struggle too has to be twofold against
Brahmanism that seeks to saffronize the educational institutions and against
imperialist global capital that seeks to include education in GATS, as a
tradable service. The attacks are in tandem so must be the resistance.
The composition of the campuses has
drastically changed in terms of gender and caste ratio in the last two and half
a decade. The erstwhile victims of educational deprivation under Manuvad – the
SC/ST/OBC/women constitute the majority in campuses with corresponding rise in
the Dalit scholarship and assertion and feminist scholarship and assertion. JNU
has over 50% female students. Had this
been the case in 1989-90, the anti-Mandal episode would not have been the one
way euphoria. It would have been a fierce contest. We together, the Marxists
and Ambedkarites, constitute a very strong force against fascists, and
separately we are amenable to be crushed one-by-one as it happened in Nazi
Germany. It is not imagination of fascism, it is the real one. The ABVP is
breaking the meetings and heads, as has been repeatedly said above, in Police
presence in the manner of Nazi storm troopers. Let us learn from the
history.
What
is to be done?
As has been said above, fascism of this
undeclared emergency is more dangerous than of the declared one of 1975 for two
reasons. Firstly, Indira Gandhi, to validate her pro-people image and USSR
support had targeted many middle class rightists; particularly the RSS that
aroused a substantial middle class anger, this fascism is targeting the
minorities, the poor and down trodden and their supporters. Secondly, Indira
had only state’s coercive apparatus to suppress the dissent on her disposal,
Modi has in addition to that, the paramilitary outfits of RSS and
rumormongering channels on his disposal. Therefore the resistance must be
strong and united exemplified by our young comrades that must continue.
The youth, historically, has been the guiding
force of the past revolutionary movements. It may be my fantasy but to me it
appears to beginning of a cultural revolution, the Indian Enlightenment with a
new vigor, new insight and new alliance of forces. The objective conditions of
fascist repression and united resistance by students with twin slogans of the Jay
Bhim Bhim-Lal Salam has created a platform of unity in struggle of all the
radical forces. This platform has potentiality of the transcendence of
unity/alliance in practice into unity/alliance of theory, only if the high
commands do not command and allow the youth to take the lead. Immediate target
is the nexus of the ideologies of RSS fascism thriving on Brahmanical belief
system and imperialist corporatism. This platform has potentiality of creating
a new theory of socialism through brain storming sessions of synthesis and
integration of the teaching of Marx and Ambedkar that gives a theoretic shape
to the unity of the slogans of Jay Bhim and Lal Salam. Let us
turn the potentiality into reality. It
may sound too optimistic, but doable. Rohit Vemula’s martyrdom is the
inspiration. To pay him the tributes is to do the doable.
Last but not the least is about the role of
non-party left that solidly stands with the Idea of JNU. A large section of
individuals under the influence of Marxism remain outside party structure, who
are often in the forefronts in the mass protests in the crisis periods, must
realize that any effective contribution to the progressive development is
possible through organized force only. They must, through social media to begin
with, work out some alternative form of organization to join the students’
efforts against the fascist designs.
Ish
Mishra
Associate
Professor
Dept.
of Political Science
Hindu
College, University of Delhi
Delhi
110007
9811146846
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