NEW DELHI: The Congress on Tuesday demanded a law against discrimination of people from weaker sections in educational institutions across the country.
"What happened to Rohith (Vemula) has not happened to him exclusively, many students across the educational institutes face discrimination. Our girls are suppressed, Dalits are discriminated against and tribals are repressed," Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi said.
Gandhi was addressing a protest march organised here by various students organisations to condemn the "institutional killing" of the 26-year-old scholar from Hyderabad University.
"If you really want to fight this oppression, we need an anti-discrimination law enacted in all colleges and universities that stops any kind of prejudice and bigotry against the weaker section. I had suggested them to look at it. We in Congress party are also mulling over it to get such a law enacted that stops the student oppression," he added.
He claimed the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was robbing students and thinkers of their freedom of expression and dissent.
"RSS and BJP want to impose one language one ideology on everyone throughout the country. They don't want other ideas and traditions to flourish but we don't want our India to be like this. We want crores of ideas, crores of ideologies, an India where creativity flourishes."
"Rohith symbolises creativity and all the youngsters with us will fight for this creativity. We will fight for it and win this battle," Gandhi said.
Hundreds of students and faculty members from various universities gathered at the Ambedkar Bhawan earlier in the day and took out a march till Jantar Mantar to condemn Rohith Vemula's killing.
Members of the National Students' Union of India (NSUI), Bahujan Samaj Party and the Aam Aadmi Party students' wing Chhatra Yuva Sangharsh Samiti (CYSS) also participated in the solidarity march along with students of the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and Delhi University (DU).