CHENNAI: IIT-Madras seems to have got itself entangled in another major controversy. It has reportedly cancelled the lectures of three internationally acclaimed activists, who were scheduled to deliver lectures on “Social Equity” as part of annual NSS foundation day celebrations later this month.
Noted documentary filmmaker and human rights activist K Stalin, who filmed riots against Muslim minorities in Gujarat 2002 and documented caste discrimination against dalit communities with his film India Untouched and Lesser Humans; Nandini Sundar, a professor of Sociology at Delhi School of Economics (DSE), and social entrepreneur Adhik Kadam, who runs an NGO called Borderless World Foundation in Jammu and Kashmir are the three speakers, whose lectures were cancelled by the administration without specifying the reason.
The entire episode was botched up considering the fact that Adhik Kadam was not even informed about the cancellation. When this reporter contacted Kadam for his reaction was when he realised his lecture was dropped.
“My lecture is scheduled for September 16 (Saturday) and I reached Bengaluru. I was planning to catch a train to Chennai tomorrow. Neither the students nor the administration have informed me about the cancellation, which is very unfortunate. I seek an explanation,” he told Express.
The former member of NSS managerial team Biyas Muhammed, who studies humanities and social sciences at IIT Madras, alleged that the speakers were invited and confirmed by the student team of NSS, but were later rejected by the Faculty Advisor of NSS K C Sivakumar and Dean of Students M S Sivakumar. “The administration has not given any reason, except for labelling the speakers controversial,” he claimed.
“By cancelling the lectures, the administration has made it clear that the caste system, tribal issues and human rights issues associated with border tensions shouldn’t be discussed even on the platform of a social service organisation like NSS. This decision by the IIT Madras administration clearly exposes their strong ideological bias,” he alleged.
In the chain of mails exchanged between Stalin, Nandini, NSS managerial team and the faculty advisor of NSS, which were accessed by Express, the faculty advisor was kept in the loop about the speakers’ choice, invitations sent and the consent, but at no stage he raised objection.
After everything was finalised, the lectures were cancelled. The administration in the mail sent to two of the three speakers has cited the reason for cancellation as “unforeseen circumstances”. No explanation was given on what those circumstances were.
Reacting to the controversy, Stalin and Nandini said as a reputed institution, IIT Madras should allow students to debate and learn about social issues. “We have written to IIT Madras asking what the unforeseen circumstances were, but there is no reply,” they said.
Stalin said: “This is not the first time my lectures have been cancelled citing unforeseen reasons. Often this sort of backing out is done out of fear of displeasing the powers that be. Sometimes college/university administration (students too) meek out because they confuse standing up for human rights with partisan political stands.”
And often, lectures or film screenings are cancelled because the speaker/film is seen as anti to the ideologies they prescribe to or have come to terms with. In all cases, what is lost is an opportunity to debate and understand life and society from another perspective.
Educational institutions, of all the places, need to be the bastion of intellectual pursuit and no subject or person or position should be outside the scope of scrutiny or exploration. Unless the motive of education is to merely create unthinking cogs in the wheel (or should I say “bricks in the wall”),” he rued. When contacted, Dean of Students M S Sivakumar refused to comment on the issue.