Agitating students at the Hyderabad central university are selling a dossier of documents relating to the suicide of a Dalit scholar that outraged the nation and caused political friction for the ruling BJP.
An information desk set up by a Joint Action Committee of the agitating students said they put together information relating to the suspension of the five research scholars from the University of Hyderabad as well as the suicide letter of Rohith Vemula. The dossier is being sold for Rs 70.
The collection of almost 70 documents contains the Facebook comments by the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) student leader that triggered the controversy, Union minister Bandar Dattatreya’s letter to human resource ministry as well as the ministry’s missives to the university, Vemula’s SC caste certificate, suicide note, reports from the police, hospital and university regarding the alleged attack on the ABVP leader, suspension orders of the scholars and the court affidavit.
Though initially priced at Rs 50, students said they had to up the price due to the cost of photocopying.
{{/usCountry}}Though initially priced at Rs 50, students said they had to up the price due to the cost of photocopying.
{{/usCountry}}A notice claimed the documents could be accessed for free online on their Facebook page, Joint Action Committee for Social Justice – UoH. However, very few documents were available on Saturday.
A judicial inquiry into the circumstances that led to Rohith Vemula’s suicide was ordered on Friday as the crisis at University of Hyderabad intensified as protesters rejected the revocation of the four students’ suspension and refused to end their strike until the vice-chancellor resigned.
A fact-finding committee reported “a complete systemic failure” and blamed the university authorities for handling the issue “insensitively” that began in August last year when Vemula and other students from the Ambedkar Students’ Association staged a protest against the hanging of Yakub Memon, the convicted terrorist in the 1993 Mumbai blasts. The judicial probe report would be submitted within three months, the ministry said.