How and why RSS is attempting a total takeover of JNU

For the first time in the history of Jawaharlal Nehru University and possibly in any university, its teacher's body, JNUTA, called for a public enquiry against its own VC, Professor M Jagadesh Kumar, for allegedly violating various conventions of the university. It gave Professor Kumar a three-day deadline to appear in his defence. Some of the accusations levelled are undermining the integrity of the faculty selection process, violation of reservation policy, harassing teachers by denying their legitimate dues, undermining sexual harassment watchdog GSCASH and showing lackadaisical attitude in the missing student Najeeb’s case.

This unprecedented step, however, is not surprising, considering the trajectory of events and incidents that have taken place in the institution.

“A university stands for humanism, for tolerance, for reason, for the adventure of ideas and for the search of truth. It stands for the onward march of the human race towards ever higher objectives. If the universities discharge their duties adequately, then it is well with the nation and the people.” It was precisely in keeping with the spirit of these words of India’s first Prime Minister that the JNU Act was passed in 1966 and the university established in 1969.

Right from its inception, JNU was not supposed to be just another centre of learning. It was, instead, designed to be a grand experiment in inter-disciplinary and socially relevant education. It was meant to emerge as a laboratory of progressive critical thought. That it has done. Today, from academia to media, from bureaucracy to policy framing, from politics to activism, JNU alumni have left their indelible mark in nearly all the fields they have treaded on.

But as a necessary corollary, the university has been in the gunsight of the right wing cultural nationalist Jan Sangh ever since its inception. Professor Emeritus CP Bhambri, from the Centre of Political Studies, JNU, goes back in time: “The animosity of the Sangh Parivar towards JNU has been purely ideological. Those days in the 70’s, they would challenge faculty appointments on the floor of Parliament. And the School of Social Sciences has always been their principal target.”

The electoral verdict of 2014 has brought about a marked break with the past. What were necessary irritants in the democratic and critical learning space during the Morarji Desai or Atal Bihari Vajpayee days seem to have been replaced by a systematic Sangh gameplan to take over the institution in its entirety.

And the appointment of a pliant Vice-Chancellor, a professor of Electrical Engineering known for his proximity to the Sangh-affiliated Vijnan Bharati, was a step in the right direction. He is Professor Jagadesh Kumar.

“JNU, as a university, stands not just as a custodian of the inclusive, tolerant, secular fabric of the nation but strengthens the democratic contours of the same. This comes as a threat to a cultural nationalist, paramilitary organisation like RSS,” opines Professor Bhambri.

JNU can’t be seen in isolation. The RSS-guided state is moving towards fascism and like every fascist state, it wants to control every institution of learning, knowledge production and opinion formation. Dissidents are under constant surveillance. Hence, in February 2016, students of JNU were arrested, for venting their opinion, under the most authoritarian capital law of the land, namely sedition.

Preeti Gulati is a research scholar in the School of Social Sciences and has seen the fundamental nature of the administration change over the last five years. “JNU has always had its culture of protests, dharnas, sending out fact-finding missions to distant parts of the country to ascertain problems and understand issues. We have always fought the administration but we knew the administration was with us. This is for the first time, we have got an anti-JNU VC and administration. You can’t recall a single pro-student measure this new order has taken,” she says.

A lot of her fellow students are angry at cuts in subscriptions to academic journals, withdrawal of scholarships, non-notification of the Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowships for the current year meant for SC/ST students, the administration’s plans to do away with deprivation points which enable people from weaker sections of the society to come and study at the premier institute.

Also, in the history of JNU, for the first time, only 139 admissions took place in the academic year beginning in 2017 for all M.Phil and Ph.D programmes, Abhimanyu Kumar, another research scholar, informs National Herald. Usually the number is upwards of 1000. And very interestingly majority of the cuts have come in centres belonging to schools such as social sciences, international studies and languages where teachers and students are naturally opposed to the cultural monolithic ideology of the Sangh.

National Herald spoke to several professors and found that newly appointed VC Jagadesh Kumar has been pushing things through without approval of the Academic Council.

Professor Jayati Ghosh from the Centre for Economic Studies and Planning says, “I was present in an Academic Council meet where the VC inserted things into the meeting’s minutes without discussing them. It was about his discretion to add names of outsiders to the selection committee responsible for faculty recruitments. In the same way, five senior people were superseded in the appointment of the Dean of Social Sciences. This is unprecedented in the history of JNU. We have moved the court on several of these matters.”

Other professors like Professor Sucheta Mahajan, chairperson of Centre for Historical Studies, also voiced similar concerns. “We just had a position filled in ancient Indian history where the experts brought in by the VC were not subject matter experts.”

She added, “While the VC talks of not allowing Ph.D candidates from JNU to be eligible for faculty positions, he has been selective about it.” A brief interaction with other faculty members revealed that one student, who submitted his Ph.D a month back, was already issued an appointment letter to the utmost dismay of the chairperson and other faculty members. “We had at least four brilliant students who deserved to be in the fray,” said one teacher who did not want to be named.

Also, the VC has stopped the practice of natural reemployment of senior professors in various departments after their retirement. Previously an extension of five years was a natural event as students benefit from interactions with stalwarts in their own fields.

Mahajan says, more than ideology, the culture of mediocrity that has gripped the institution worries her more. “Top positions in JNU have been always held by people who are recognised scholars in their own fields. Today, things are different. You can’t look up to the leadership any more. They do not inspire you, they lack leadership.”

Professor Ghosh also spoke about the JNU administration’s attempts to push in people without M.Phil, Ph.D or publications for faculty positions. “In history, economics and in international studies, these attempts are being made. You have someone in the Korean language faculty who can’t teach Korean. This will have a serious bearing on the academic performance and rigour for which JNU is respected throughout the world.”

These point towards a full-fledged appointment scam. As the selection committee consists of the VC himself, the Dean of the School, Visitor’s nominee and three experts (brought in by the VC), the chairperson of the centre can do very little beyond putting in a note of dissent when undeserving candidates are pushed through.

The JNU administration’s disbanding of the Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GSCASH) has also sent shockwaves across the entire JNU community – teachers, students, workers and contract staff. Much before the Vishakha guidelines or the UGC notifications on the matter, JNU instituted GSCASH in the late 1990s. The committee has been at the forefront of delivering justice in numerous such cases. The authorities have now replaced it with an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) which again is filled with people with a particular ideological disposition that is not actually known for its gender sensitivity.

Students have boycotted ICC and have held GSCASH elections. There is a court case on this matter in progress as well. All the three student representatives in ICC are from the ABVP stable, students told National Herald.

A professor from the School of Social Sciences went to the extent of stating that ICC was created to shield some people, allegedly close to the administration, who have been accused in cases of sexual harassment. Apparently the last GSCASH committee was subjected to a lot of pressure while dealing with a case involving a Professor from the School of International Studies.

Rajat Dutta of the Centre for Historical Studies has been a hostel warden for 11 years and cites how Warden checks have become an instrument of intimidation and shaming. JNU has always had the culture of free mixing and mingling between people from opposite sexes. “Then, we would knock on a student’s door and find out if any illegal guest was staying. Be it a boy or a girl, the fine was levied. There was never any moralisation of what happened between two consenting adults,” he says.

That culture has fundamentally changed. A flying squad of wardens, ideologically aligned with the Sangh and often from another hostel, and security guards has been created. During one such recent raid, names of girl students who were found in boys’ rooms were selectively leaked to the media and some of their parents apparently contacted. This culture of shaming is new to the campus, another one of the imports of the culture of top-driven imposition of so-called Indian ethos. Teachers have turned police.

The strategy to take over JNU is a concerted and well-thought out one. JNU stands against the RSS agenda of cultural transformation of India. While the RSS sees Indian history and philosophy as being influenced by Western cultural thoughts, unlike progressive nationalist historians or their Marxist counterparts, their agenda is not to decolonise the narrative.

The wish of the current VC to introduce engineering and management courses in the varsity is not just aimed at changing the demographics of the university but also at creating an ideology-neutral constituency that is natural to those disciplines of study which are product and technology-related and not so much immersed in the realm of thought.

JNU was famous for its 24X7 dhabas, late night musical sessions, heated debates over cups of tea and post-dinner mess meetings and talks. The administration has clamped down on those as well. While most messes have been barred from holding meetings and talks, the dhabas now shut down by 12 midnight. Couples seating under a tree are subjected to flashlight queries from security guards. This imposition of ‘discipline’ runs antithetical to the spirit and culture of JNU.

Today’s India is a paradox. The Indian state is controlled by the Hindutva-aligned RSS, the government is run by former pracharaks but they have to operate within the ambits of the Constitution. But the battle of JNU is a crucial step in the RSS’ final aim of rewriting the Constitution. If ideas can be stymied, if the natural flow of critical thought can be arrested, the ultimate goal becomes much easier to achieve.

Students, faculty members and a large section of the alumni believe that JNU, famous for its colourful campus life, impeccable academic record and the transformative life experience of its students, teachers and staff, will be able to withstand the onslaught to impose a linear, boring, patriarchal, rigid, unpleasant, monolithic and top-driven system of thought. They are also aware that there cannot be any room for complacency in this struggle.

Voices from JNU

CP Bhambri (Emeritus Professor, Centre for Political Studies)

"For the first time, JNU has got a VC who goes and attends Mohan Bhagwat's lectures. The RSS-affiliated Vijnana Bharati has claimed he is associated with it. Professor Jagadesh Kumar is on record for saying that Vijnana Bharati is a 'good organisation doing good work.' "

Jayati Ghosh (Professor, Centre for Economic Studies and Planning)

"The RSS attempt to take over JNU is a small part of the Sangh's attempt to usurp every institution of importance in the country. I am afraid that they may even take a leaf out of Tayyip Erdogan's crackdown on his opponents in Turkey following the Istanbul terror attack. I do not discount the possibility of this government orchestrating something similar."

Sucheta Mahajan (Chairperson and Professor, Centre for Historical Studies)

"The current JNU administration is trying to impose a totalitarian regime on students and teachers alike. Dissent is being penalised and a culture of ingraining fear in the minds of the stakeholders is being promoted. Undeserving candidates are being appointed as faculty members just because they come from the same ideological stable."

Rajat Datta (Professor, Centre for Historical Studies)

"The attack on JNU is a well concerted and thought-out two-pronged strategy of the Sangh Parivar that could serve as a template to go after all public-funded educational institutions. First is the element of cultural transformation of India and the second one is the corporatisation and privatisation of educational institutions."

Om Prasad (Ph.D student, Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies)

"The corporate life of JNU has always been a transformative experience for its students. Whoever passes through these gates leaves with a different perspective about life, society, politics, the country and the wider world. However, this government is afraid of that. They would like students to be straight-jacketed. That serves their purpose."

Abhimanyu Kumar (Ph.D student, Centre for Historical Studies)

"The School of Social Sciences, always critical of the Sangh's ideology, has borne the brunt of the reduction in number of M.Phil and Ph.D seats. There are talks about the administration's plans to do away with deprivation points, which is unique to JNU and has enabled so many pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds to come and study here."

Preeti Gulati (Ph.D student, Centre for Historical Studies)

"The administration has disbanded the Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GSCASH) and has instead replaced it with an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) where all members, including student representatives, come from the Hindutva factory. Students, barring those supporting ABVP, have rejected it outright."

A list of wrongs

• Comparative Politics A person, whose credentials were much lower than many good candidates, was selected despite protest from the Chairperson and dissent from an acclaimed expert, using the majority principle.
• Historical Studies For a position in ancient Indian history, despite notes of dissent from two of the best known historians of ancient India on the selection panel, the VC allowed the so-called expert, a historian of modern India, to select a mediocre candidate over at least half a dozen excellent ones.
• Political Studies Despite strong protest from the Chairperson and the Dean, a less suitable candidate, an active ABVP member, was selected to join the faculty while many much deserving candidates were in the fray.
• Science School In School of Biotechnology and Centre for Molecular Medicine, candidates of low merit were chosen in the most dubious manner.
• Modus Operandi As the faculty selection committee consists of the VC himself, the Dean of the School, Visitor’s nominee and three experts (brought in by the VC), the chairperson of the centre can do very little beyond putting in a note of dissent when undeserving candidates are pushed through.
• Refusing Extensions The VC has stopped the practice of natural reemployment of senior professors in various departments after their retirement. Previously an extension of five years was a natural event as students benefit from interactions with stalwarts in their own fields.
• Sexual Harassment A professor from the School of Social Sciences said that the Internal Complaints Committee was created and the older Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GSCASH) was scrapped to shield some people, allegedly close to the administration, who have been accused in cases of sexual harassment.