No event without permission: JNU after portrait row

Referring to the attack on a Tamil student, Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin sought strict action from JNU administration.

The Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) administration said on Monday that students will need to take prior permission to hold any activity in the hostels, student activity center (Teflas), and sports ground, according to a notification.

Police personnel detain activists from a Hindu outfit outside the JNU campus on Monday. (Vipin Kumar/ht photo)

The directions were issued a day after members of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and JNU students union (JNUSU) traded charges over alleged vandalisation at JNUSU office (Teflas). While ABVP claimed that members of Left organisations disrespected a portrait of Shivaji, JNUSU said that ABVP attacked students at Teflas and defaced the walls with provocative slogans.

Referring to the attack on a Tamil student, Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin sought strict action from JNU administration. “Universities are not just spaces for learning but also for discussion, debate & dissent. The cowardly attack on Tamil students by ABVP and vandalisation of the portraits of leaders like Periyar, Karl Marx at JNU, is highly condemnable and calls for strict action from the university administration,” Stalin tweeted on Monday.

Nazar, a PhD scholar from Tamil Nadu, who sustained injuries in an altercation between the two groups on Sunday, alleged that ABVP vandalised portraits of Periyar and Marx, and attacked students including him. “A screening was organised by the Hundred Flowers group at JNUSU office at Teflas. ABVP members were present, and they thrashed members of the Hundred Flowers group. We received an alert that ABVP was attacking students and reached the office to find that walls had been defaced and portraits of Periyar and Marx were damaged. We were leaving Teflas but ABVP members entered again and beat up students. I was also injured. Later, ABVP members tried to pull us out of the ambulance when we were going to Safdarjung for treatment,” said Nazar (who goes by single name).

However, the university said that the vice-chancellor has ordered a thorough enquiry into the matter.

In a statement issued in Tamil, the university administration said, “Last Sunday, in the university student centre (Teflas), some students and outsiders misbehaved. In the ensuing confusion (melee), it is said that our respected national leaders were disrespected, which is not true. The statement is distorted and peddled with a false narrative. The VC has ordered a thorough inquiry into the matter. Respecting the services rendered by our national leaders and maintaining diversity and good relationships in the campus, go hand in hand, and that is what the VC and the university administration wish for. Whoever acts against these values will be dealt with legally,” the varsity said.

In a separate notification issued by Dean of Students Sudheer P Singh, JNU said that permission would be needed for holding any activity in the premises of the inter-hall of the administration including hostels, student activity center (Teflas), and sports ground. “Any event organised without due formal permission will invite disciplinary action as per university rules,” the notification said.

DMK MP Kanimozhi also condemned the attack on students in JNU including an attack on a student from Tamil Nadu. “It’s distressing to see the plight of some of the youngsters who have succumbed to hate politics. It’s worrying to note that this is not the first motivated attack on students on this campus. The administration should have set up mechanisms to control this. We stand with students against right-wing politics that seek to disrupt educational institutions’ diverse democratic spaces,” Kanimozhi wrote in separate tweets.

The JNU unit of ABVP, however, denied allegations, and slammed Stalin for tweeting about the incident without knowing being aware of the details. “MK Stalin is clueless about last night’s incident in JNU the same way he is clueless about the pathetic condition of state universities in Tamil Nadu. The only image that was vandalised in JNU last night was of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj by urban naxals of JNU,” said a tweet posted on the official Twitter handle of ABVP JNU.