Have variety on campus, not brutal dominance
Revelations from the police investigation into the death of a student at the College of Veterinary and Animal Sciences at Pookode in Wayanad have confirmed the apprehensions of those who have been watching developments on Kerala campuses. JS Sidharthan, a second-year student, was found hanging in a hostel bathroom on February 18. The police report says the death was a fallout of the lawlessness reigning in many state educational institutes.
The college’s unwritten law is understood to be that allegations against students are settled at a kangaroo court set up by the students themselves. Sidharthan, against whom there was an allegation of misbehaving with a girl student, was summoned to the hostel courtyard, stripped in front of scores of students, and brutally beaten up. What is more appalling is that not even a single voice of protest emerged from the onlookers and no one spoke about the incident till it hit the headlines.
The accused have been arrested and the customary agency inquiries have been ordered. The Students Federation of India (SFI) has expelled those involved in the incident, including its unit secretary and college union chairman. But the saddest part is that the miscreants are still not ready to accept the gravity of their mistake.
They see it as a mere aberration, an isolated incident. The allegation is that the incident is a grim reflection of the kind of politics followed by the SFI—which has a clear majority in colleges across the state—on campuses. There have been similar accusations in the past about SFI pursuing a politics of intolerance and converting campuses into its fiefdoms.
Terror is unleashed and physical attacks are mounted on opponents to preserve its dominance. The element of fear was palpable on the Wayanad college campus, where no one showed the courage to say no to the mob trial.
The CPM, being the ruling party, has to act more responsibly and must rein in its student wing. It must be ensured that campuses are an open space where different ideologies and views are creatively debated. No such deliberations will be possible if colleges have torture rooms and arenas of mob lynching. It must be remembered that democracy will be the first casualty if only one voice is heard on campuses.