BHU needs a VC like Ram Dayal Munda

Not many people will recognise the name of Ram Dayal Munda. He was a Rajya Sabha MP very briefly and a member of the National Advisory Committee (NAC) constituted by the UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi before cancer took him away when we needed him the most. I was fortunate to have made his acquaintance and cherish the memories. The memories came flooding back in August when I watched the moving documentary film made on his life by his son and directed by old friend Meghnath. I was once again reminded of Ram Dayal this Sunday when I tracked the unfortunate events at BHU.

Ram Dayal, a Munda tribal, had spent 17 years in the United States, seven of them studying Anthropology in the University of Chicago and the rest teaching in an American University. He had married an American and lived a happy life. But when Dr Kumar Suresh Singh, IAS and then the Vice Chancellor of Ranchi University invited him to start a PG Department of Tribal and Regional Languages, he readily agreed and flew back home, Hazel, his wife in tow.

I was introduced to him by Dr Singh and soon I discovered what an extraordinary man he was. Soon after he joined as the HOD of the Department, he wanted sanction for an open air auditorium. But the University had no money to give. Undeterred, Ram Dayal mobilised his students and colleagues and took upon himself the task of building the amphitheatre. I have no idea how much money he spent from his own pocket but I was privy to the remarkable sight of Dr Ram Dayal Munda, other Professors and the students carrying bricks and build the galleries brick by brick. It made a great story for The Telegraph for which I was working at the time.

I also remember the time when I went looking for him for a chat. He was getting a house constructed for himself just behind the Ranchi College. I was reassured when I saw his motorcycle parked outside. But there was no sign of Ram Dayal. I moved around and then called out. He responded from somewhere but I couldn’t see him. He finally emerged down a ladder. He was himself casting the roof ! That was the tribal custom, he explained, when all friends and relatives get together to build a house.

Like most tribal people, he loved music and dance. When a folk singer from the US Bill Crofut was hosted in Ranchi by the then USIS ( now American center), he was intrigued by Ram Dayal’s playing a huge drum and the flute. He innovated learning, asked his students to record folklores, folk music and history of their villages by talking to the elders during the vacation. He invited every week ‘outsiders’ to the department for interacting with students, among them farmers, journalists and bureaucrats.

Not surprisingly, he caught attention of people. He cut a dashing figure, tall, dark and handsome; his eyes twinkling almost all the time; a smile always hovered on his lips. And he was as comfortable living in a five star hotel as in a poor journalist’s home. I was very happy when he was appointed the Vice Chancellor of Ranchi University. He was not the first tribal to be appointed the VC. That honour probably went to Dr AK Dhan, who too was erudite and was a member of the UPSC. But Ram Dayal was younger and more down to earth.

We kept in touch even after my then editor MJ Akbar transferred me to Patna. Ram Dayal had to visit the state capital and he would make a point to look me up. Somehow the then chief minister Bindeshwari Dubey came to know that Ram Dayal and I knew each other and were close. I was surprised when he one day confided how unhappy and embarrassed he was with my ‘friend’.

I looked at him quizzically. But Dubey ji seemed really upset. The then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi had visited Khunti, 30 KMs from Ranchi and it seems a bare bodied Ram Dayal led the dancers who greeted the dignitary. A very cross Bindeshwari Dubey confided that he was mortified. “Imagine a Vice Chancellor dancing and singing in front of the PM,” he said and seemed to be still in a state of shock. I felt like laughing out loud. I told him that for tribals, music is an integral part of life and living and he should be proud of Ram Dayal. He was not convinced.

Some six months later, the chief minister invited me to lunch. He had called the then Chief Secretary, Arun Pathak, also to join us. He knew my sympathy for the demand of a separate Jharkhand state and wanted to elicit my views. During lunch, he again referred to Ram Dayal and said how upset he was with my friend. “Imagine, we appoint him the Vice Chancellor and he goes and attends a meeting of the ABVP,” he exclaimed bitterly.

That evening I called up Ram Dayal and conveyed the chief minister’s outburst. He listened to me as I pleaded with him to be more careful. I was convinced that the university needed him at the helm. He should not do anything to upset the Government, I naively suggested. I will never forget his reply.

“Please tell the chief minister that I believe a university is meant for students and students alone. As Vice Chancellor, I am responsible for each one of them. I will go wherever, whenever and whoever among them ask for my presence; it does not matter whether it is ABVP or NSUI,” he told me firmly.

No, I never conveyed this to the CM. But sure enough Ram Dayal was removed as VC and sent back to the Department as HOD within a few months of our conversation.

Where are Vice Chancellors like him?