NEW DELHI: Students of Jawaharlal Nehru University are moving into another round of protests against the JNU Administration, for expelling 10 students for allegedly barging into an Academic Council meet at the Convention Centre.

The students wanted the AC to consider their demands for reducing viva marks from 30 to 10, rollback of a fee hike and implementation of minority deprivation points. The Administration claimed that they had broken the locks of the door and disrupted the meeting of the highest decision making body of the varsity.

The students—eight of them presently studying in different centres of the University,: Rahul Sonepimple ( Student Union Presidential Candidate, BAPSA), Bhupali Kusum Vitthal (BAPSA), Dawa Sherpa (DSU), Mulayam Singh Yadav (United OBC Forum), Dilip Yadav (SFS), Shakeel Anjum (Former Student Union General Secretary from AISA, independent activist currently), Prashant Kumar and Mrintunjay Singh have denied disrupting the meeting but said that they wanted their demands to be heard by the Administration as has been the practice earlier. They said that the JNU administration “has turned authoritarian, just like the government.”


Two other students—Birendra and Praveen have been listed as outsiders though the students said that they are pursuing their PhD and are in their third and first semesters respectively. The students are facing academic suspension and removal from the hostel “with immediate effect.”

Interestingly, most of the students belong to the marginalised sections such as SC, ST and minority category and hail from far-flung and backward areas of the country. The JNU Students Union, led by representatives from AISA and SFI has said that they stand in solidarity with the suspended students and shall fight hard to get the suspensions revoked.

However, the students from the Ambedkarite and extreme-left parties have declined to join the JNUSU protest insisting that the students body was “Brahminical just like the Administration and the Teachers’ Union.”

Rahul Sonepimple from BAPSA commented, “both the Administration and the Union condemned our protest as undemocratic…both of them collectively passed the decision of fee hike, the AISA-SFI led Union failed to show up for the protest as well. They [AISA-SFI] must close their shops of solidarity and enjoy a cup of Brahminical impunity with casteist JNUTA and JNU Administration.”

Shehla Rashid had earlier in the day tweeted that BAPSA’s “actions were just a political positioning.” A wave 0f comments and rebuttals from Ambedkarite fractions had condemned the statement.

Students gathered at the iconic Administration Building, or Freedom Square—a moniker coined by the left-leaning students---to protest against the expulsion order. The Union was absent, raising further questions on the unity of the student movement on a campus that has seen turbulent months since the February 9 incident when several students of the campus were arrested for allegedly raising “anti-national” slogans, all of them were later granted bail.

The students with tambourines and posters called for a revocation of the order and called upon the Vice Chancellor to speak to the students. Few teachers had also joined the protest. After sloganeering for about half an hour students from across schools took turns to voice out their opinions. Birendra Kumar, a student at Centre of Historical Studies said that the decision was an “attack on the subaltern” and was confident that a “unity of the oppressed” shall “surely defeat the Brahminical forces.”


Later in the day, sources confirmed that a section of teachers called upon the protesting students and the Student Union representatives and persuaded them for a united fight as opposed to sectarian protests that are “against the spirit of JNU.” All all-organization meeting that went on till late at night decided for a protest march “Fight Back JNU” on Thursday. The Students Union has urged the students to join the “march of social justice” and “give united rejection to all the tactics of the Sanghi Vice Chancellor.”

The Union has released a press invite to voice their concerns on the suspension calling this and UGC notification“an assault on democratic right to education and an attempt to restrict an entry of students from oppressed and marginalised sections.” A stream of messages are flooding various JNU debate pages and groups on Facebook and other social media, with students with different political orientations arguing on the further course of action. ABVP, however, seemed disinterested.

(Pictures by Richa Kohli and Sohail Bhatti. Report by Kumar Prashant)

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KUMAR PRASHANT