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‘Shenanigans of Left-wing activists’: Academicians to PM Modi over campus violence cases
Violence erupted at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) campus on January 5 when a number of masked people armed with sticks and sledgehammer were seen vandalizing hostels, thrashing and threatening students.
More than 200 academicians, including vice chancellors of universities, wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday over recent incidents of violence in varsity campuses across the country. Expressing concern over the agitations, the academicians said the university campuses are being turned into “islands of ossified worldviews.”
The signatories to the statement include Hari Singh Gour University VC R P Tiwari, Central University of South Bihar VC HCS Rathore and Sardar Patel University VC Shirish Kulkarni, among others, reported news agency ANI.
“The recent turn of events on the campuses from JNU to Jamia, from AMU to Jadavpur alarms us to the deteriorating academic environment due to the shenanigans of a small coterie of left-wing activists,” the academics said in the letter.
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Violence erupted at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) campus on January 5 when a number of masked people armed with sticks and sledgehammer were seen vandalizing hostels, thrashing and threatening students.
Violent protests were also reported from other universities across the country against the newly amended citizenship act.
The letter, accessed by ANI, alleged the “censorship imposed by left-wing politics” is making it difficult to “organise public talks or to speak independently” at the campuses.
“Strikes, dharnas and shutdowns over maximalist demands are common in left strongholds. Personal targeting, public slandering and harassment for not conforming to the left ideology is on increase,” read the letter.
“They also lose out on the freedom to articulate their own views and alternative politics. They find themselves constrained to conform to the majoritarian left politics,” it said.
Calling for academic freedom, the top academics said the protests and incidents of violence are turning students into political activists rather than learners.
Massive protests were witnessed against the CAA, mainly by the student community, since its passage by Parliament in December last year.
