In a recent letter, social activist and writer Mahasweta Devi advised West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to "continue to follow your raj dharma". Though many from the Trinamool Congress have interpreted this as praise for the chief minister's work, observers feel considering the recent police apathy at Jadavpur University it is time the Banerjee-government was reminded of what its "raj dharma" was.
On August 28, a student was sexually assaulted on the university campus. To protest against the university authorities' apathy at the case, students sat on a dharna at Aurobindo Bhavan (the vice-chancellor's office) premises from September 11, expressing their anguish through various media - drama, poetry and music. They demanded a fresh probe committee, saying they had no faith in the internal probe being conducted by the college.
The students were also agitated at the fact that Vice-Chancellor Abhijit Chakraborty hadn't even met the victim's parents when they had called on him.
On Tuesday, students gheraoed the vice-chancellor's office till late into the night. While there were contradictory versions of what exactly led to a police lathi-charge and assault on the protesting students at around 2 am on Wednesday, video footage showed the police, some in uniform and some in plain clothes, resorting to strong-arm tactics, resulting in 36 students, including girls, being hospitalised.
Some students alleged members of the ruling Trinamool Congress, posing as police, were also involved in the incident.
"We were staging a sit-in outside Aurobindo Bhavan and singing. Suddenly the lights went out at 2 am and people in civil clothes arrived, along with some police. I can easily identify one of them who touched us, groped us. I am a victim of this. When the boys came to protest, they were beaten up," said first-year student Rittika Dasgupta.
Once one of India's premier educational institutions, Jadavpur University boasts of a rich history. Its parent body, the National Council of Education, was set up in 1906, in protest against British hegemony over education. At one point, the institution was one of the prominent centres of the Naxalite movement, when violence had claimed the life of the university's then vice-chancellor Gopal Chandra Sen, among others.
Since Wednesday, the campus has once again turned into the seat of an anti-government movement, with students boycotting classes, protesting against the police excesses and demanding the resignation of the vice-chancellor.
"Aye Mamata dekhe ja, Jadavpur-er kshomota; aye Trinamool dekhe ja, Jadavpur-er kshomota (Mamata, come and see the capability of Jadavpur students; Trinamool, come and see the capability of Jadavpur students)", rang the slogan. Now, the likes of poet Shankha Ghosh have also taken up the refrain.
For the Trinamool Congress, events at the university are reminiscent of its protests against police atrocities in Nandigram.
Though the state police denies all allegations, the fact that a huge force had to be deployed at midnight to rescue the vice-chancellor from his office has been dubbed excessive, even by a few Trinamool leaders such as Subrata Banerjee and Firhad Hakim. Such voices have, however, gone silent after it was seen that the party leadership, in fact, condoned the police action.
The fact that Abhijit Chakraborty, too, has defended the police action is also being questioned. Chakraborty, usually seen in blue and white attire - Banerjee's favourite colours - is known to be close to the ruling party. Recently, he was also seen sharing stage with the party leadership at a Trinamool Chhatra Parishad (TMCP) function. Reports suggest though he wasn't the first choice of the search committee set up to appoint a vice-chancellor, the state government ensured Chakraborty, earlier a teacher at Bengal Engineering and Science University, was appointed to the post.
The fact that soon after taking charge, Chakraborty ordered many university buildings be painted blue and white didn't surprise many.
Recently, the government had hand-picked him as its nominee to probe a charge that TMCP students of a BEd college in Nadia district were taking money to facilitate admissions beyond the sanctioned strength. After the probe, Chakraborty concluded the prime accused, TMCP leader Tanmay Acharya, was innocent.
Left leader Sujan Chakraborty believes the vice-chancellor is from a "TMC-loyalist tribe". He adds the party can go to any extent to defend its members.
Now, as the protests are turning into a students' movement, with the Left, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party seeking to cash in, it remains to be seen what price the government has to pay for this, in the chief minister's words, "small incident".
Though the Left has faced a crippling defeat in the recent Assembly by-polls in the state, the protests could be the seed of a revival of the Left in the state, given Jadavpur University was once a Left stronghold.
Disclaimer: These are personal views of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion of www.business-standard.com or the Business Standard newspaper
