Navaneeth A U
In my opinion, politics is not essential on our college campuses. It will destroy the bright future of students and it will divert their attention from academics to politics impacting their future. In some cases, if the student belongs to a poor economic background the family’s future income will solely depend on him. The parents will invest huge money on his education. I am also a student. I would also go to campuses in the coming years so I want to ensure my studies without any hindrance, including any type of strikes on campuses. I welcome the decision of the High Court to virtually put an end to political activities on college campuses. It is true if there is a bright side for campus politics, there will be a dark side too. But a ban on campus politics is a must considering academic interests.
Hari Arayammakul, Kozhikode
For political parties, campuses have long been a boot camp for enlisting students as their sympathisers. Overt and divisive political activities on the campus do pollute young minds and students’ unions are often used by politicians to do their ‘dirty works’. In Kerala, student politics has always been synonymous with violence and destruction of public property. Excessive campus politics is a possible reason for us to perform so poorly at the higher-education level.
All talks of student politics cultivating a democratic mindset and the threat of hardliners and mafia occupying the vacuum created by the exit of campus politics are just manufactured paranoia by politicians. Indian democracy would be better served if qualified, humane and disciplined graduates, not unruly hooligans come out of our campuses. It is high time we paid heed to the wise voices coming out of the High Court and made our campuses, temples of learning and centres of excellence.
Gopinath S, T’Puram
Politics on college campuses is very much relevant and a blanket ban is not the solution for the unhealthy practices being reported recently. The healthy side of politics needs to be encouraged in the formative years of an individual’s personality development. Students need to be sensitised and educated on politics. Debates and discussions need to be organised on all relevant topics. A blind following or a forceful push to follow an ideology of a particular political party should be discouraged.
Students should be enlightened to choose the political party of their choice after getting to know their ideologies. A total ban on campus politics, if implemented by force, will result in a leadership vacuum in future and the leaders will be insensitive to society. We need leaders who lead an exemplary life and who can be worth emulating. We don’t want shepherds who lead their herd to predecided destinations.
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Vani K, Haripad
Campus politics is a marked feature that clearly draws a distinction between school life and college days of every student. Putting a ban on such politics, by raising questions like whether or not a student goes to college to indulge in political activities, is not an end in itself. One asserts the spirit of democracy that goes by the watchwords of freedom of speech and expression by questioning rather than by confining oneself to accepted norms. When the High Court justifies the ban by stating that students can depend on student council and academic council for their issues, the stark visibility of the violation of the essence of our Constitution that upholds an individual’s right to organise protests and a sense of silent acceptance of regulations are foregrounded. The apprehension that the violent nature of student politics is detrimental to academic ambience doesn’t hold water in the absence of a proper overhauling of political system within college campuses, which may prove more beneficial than an outright prohibition.
Shabrin Abdul Rasheed
Politics has always been a crux of democracy. It is a form of expression by which people find a platform to talk about their surroundings and how they want it to be. But in the current juncture, politics has been twisted and maligned for personal interests of leaders and their subordinates, which is why I believe largescale politics distracts students away from their academic activities making them puppets in the hands of masters. It takes away moral standards and leads to chaos and destruction which ultimately leads to the downfall of education. If massive-scale politics is allowed, it will lead to a belief that only being loud and picking up a fight are the solutions to shape up a society. But a complete ban, I believe, is unnecessary. Strategic planning is needed to ensure political activities at the college level.
Prejo Sunny, Alappuzha
Campus politics has always been a panacea for students’ issues and a challenger to crooked college managements. It has reared capable youths into charismatic politicians. The Kerala High Court’s concern about campus politics is not about the concept, but about it’s functioning in the state. Kerala’s chaotic political scenario is unnecessarily reflected in college elections and debates, culminating in violent clashes and altercations.
Classes are frequently disrupted by unwanted strikes. Backed by political parties, student unions unleash havoc, turning campuses into proxy zones instead of centres of learning. These issues might have come under the HC’s consideration while prohibiting disruptive political activity on college premises. Albeit the courts’ valid concerns, a blanket ban could turn colleges into authoritarian institutions dominated by wicked managements. If both the management and students’ unions vow to perform their respective activities cordially, a blanket ban on student politics, which can endanger the fundamental right to freedom of expression, can be prevented.
K R Parvathy, Madikeri
Politics in schools and colleges is indeed a nightmare for parents in Kerala - who regarded the High Court order as a blessing to cure the waywardness of their ward. A nasty and disgusting trend has crept into the educational institutions in the state, over the years, allowing party politics proliferates to take precedence over academics, with serious consequence to career and academics of students, in which serious and non-political students pay the price in many ways.
No healthy side can be attributed to campus politics. There are only negative aspects to it. The advantage accrues only to political parties to get recruits who serve as cannon fodder to their greedy cause; that is the reason why all political parties in unison are resenting the High Court move; even preparing to pass a piece of legislation to counter the court order.
Joseph Sebastian Morris, Sakthikulangara
There are several reasons why people and courts spurn politics like poison on the college campus. First and foremost, politics is a full-time job. Learning too is a full-time job. If anyone attempts both, the result will be a miserable failure. The second is that it spells disaster on college campus disrupting normal life. Elections fought on party lines turn colleges into battlefields. Students go to college with knives and cycle chains. Murders have become common occurrences there.
A third is that it offers them a platform to express their personal and political concerns. Students must keep in touch with political developments. For, today’s students are tomorrow’s rulers. Nevertheless, the main task of the students is to study. Everything else comes secondary. A total ban is, therefore, not the ready remedy to tackle this. Political parties must avoid using students as political weapons.
A Raveendranath, Aranmula
“To let politics become a cesspool and then avoid it because it is a cesspool is a double crime.” These words of Howard Crosby ring truer in the case of campus politics and they serve as a befitting rejoinder to the ‘blanket ban.’ Both the damned-if-you-do and the damned-if-you-don’t schools of thought in campus politics are not entirely right or outright wrong. Campuses are the nurseries to nurture tomorrow’s citizens on whom the destiny of the nation is irrevocably conjoined.
They cannot and must not remain immune to or oblivious of the political realities of the day. That said, one cannot hold brief for today’s campus politics that has degenerated into disgusting party-politics playing as pawns in the hands of nit-wit politicians. What is needed is not a ‘blanket ban’ but healthy campus politics that shuns over-dependence on party-politics.
Sunny Joseph, Mala
The Kerala High Court’s observation on banning campus politics is going to create a big hullabaloo among students. I don’t think the ban will have an effect in a politically-sensitive state like Kerala, where each and every political party has students’ union. A blanket ban on campus politics may lead to students’ outfits taking out protest marches against the court order, making campus life miserable. Such a ban will allow the college managements to impose unnecessary rules on students as they wish and incidents like Jishnu case are sure to repeat. Now the functioning on college campuses is smooth owing to the active role of students’ unions. It is better to impose some restrictions rather than imposing a blanket ban.
Pauline Rose Matthai, Kochi
Campus politics is the bane of educational institutions. All factions of students compete in organising strikes to disrupt classes. If classes go on normally, the strike is deemed to be a failure. Politics on campus should be limited in such a way that classes do not suffer. Also, the direct involvement of political parties on campus should be banned. The mayhems perpetrated in the name of campus politics are many. Students even recruit goons from outside to attack their rivals. Arms are recovered from campuses at various places. Building mounds of graves, burning of chairs of the principal are not at all becoming of any student. Let the students study in a genial environment, conducive to the growth of body and mind.
Anakha K Vijay, Kochi
A complete ban on politics on campuses is an act in utter misconception of what politics means to a democratic society. If we are to denounce politics from our campuses as it is dirty, one shudders to think how we trust our politicians. Also, is not this aversion to politics that discourages enthusiastic minds from turning to politics? Further, universities are not ivory towers where a student is to develop academically alone. College education must succeed in making students socially conscious citizens who are able to exercise their franchise effectively. Colleges are vibrant social platforms where ideas take shape and which often influence policymaking. The need of the hour is to ensure a balance between insulating politics from campuses and permitting the free rein of political parties.
Debaters are vertically divided on whether campuses should be freed from politics. While a majority of the parent community has strongly opposed politics within the campus, most of the youngsters feel that politics keeps the students alive and nurtures their social commitment. We at ‘Express’ are of the opinion that politics should be allowed within campuses but it should not be a licence for violence. Politicians should be kept at an arm’s length from the goings-on on campuses, and the matters inside campuses should stay within their four walls.