NEW DELHI: The RSS-affiliated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) on Tuesday alleged that the Left-led JNU Students’ Union (JNUSU) has defaced the signboard of the road named after V D Savarkar inside the campus. The students’ union had objected to a road inside the campus being named after the Hindutva ideologue.
“The JNU administration last year took the decision to name the roads inside the campus and as a result the road at the Subansir Hostel was named after V D Savarkar, but the Left-wing students defaced it by pasting a Mohammad Ali Jinnah Marg poster,” president of ABVP-JNU Shivam Chaurasia alleged.
But former Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union (JNUSU) president N Sai Balaji claimed that the photo of the signboard with Jinnah being circulated by ABVP is ‘photoshopped’. “For all the propaganda that is happening about renaming the roads... the images what ABVP are circulating is fake & photoshopped just like their patron Savarkar’s role in freedom struggle of India!,” he posted on Twitter.
He said, “The JNU students renamed it after B R Ambedkar, who gave us Constitution of India which the RSS-BJP-ABVP hate”.
JNU Vice-chancellor M Jagadesh Kumar said the incident was “highly regrettable” and they have filed a police complaint regarding the defacement. The signboard in the name of Savarkar was installed on March 15. JNU started installing signboards in the name of freedom fighters such as Bhagat Singh, Savitribai Phule, Vivekanand, Abdul Kalam since 2018. Meanwhile, the JNU teachers association ( JNUTA) also issued a statement demanding strict action. “We strongly condemns the act of vandalism of the road signage named after Veer Savarkar in the JNU campus. This act is intended to vitiate the peaceful environment of the campus. Those who have done this should be immediately identified and punished,” the statement read.