Massive protests, one after another, against the fee hike issue by JNU students with the support of students from other institutions, civil society and teachers, compelled the HRD Ministry to talk to students and find out possible solution to fee roll back demand. The protestors have also demanded to make “Education Affordable to All.”
Following protests, a 3-member panel was appointed by the Ministry of Human Resource Development to find ways to restore normal functioning in JNU. The first meeting with JNU Students Union (JNUSU) office-bearers, student counsellors and hostel presidents was held at HRD Ministry on November 20. The second meeting concluded on November 22 and they are likely to submit their report next week.
Mohammad Danish, Joint Secretary Students Union, JNU, while speaking to Radiance, said, the panel which has agreed that our demands are genuine has not assured us anything. We are hopeful and looking forward towards what finally comes out and then we will respond accordingly. Most of the Universities have expressed solidary with us and we have received letters of solidarity from many. They are with us on the idea of public education affordable to all. We have also met some IIT students and they may also have to pay from 50 thousand to around 2 lakh per annum in coming days. Other Universities including BHU and AMU are facing the same problems in one way or the other. The fee hike idea is basically to implement the New Education Policy which is aimed at privatisation of education and the students community will not allow them to do so.
Salman Imtiaz, President AMU Students Union, told Radiance, “Students in campuses across India are being repressed by the BJP government; the only difference is that JNU gets the media attention and political space. Our government is being run by anti-poor and anti-education people who want education for elite Brahmanical class only and this makes them force suffocation of funds and dissenting space on University where the poor, marginalised and minorities study. We stand in complete solidarity with JNU students for their fight against exponential fee hike and the students fight against privatisation of education.
“JNU is our prestigious University and we will not allow the government to destroy this leader in education. Be it the fund cuts in AMU, financial blackout to AMU off campuses, increase in fees of M Tech and PhD students at IIT Bombay, rise of charges for private students in Dehradun, or the use of police force and laws to supress dissenting voices in the campuses, we reject the government’s muscular approach against students. Every AMU student is part of the battle against this state repression.”
Shayma S, MPhil, Centre for Study of Law and Governance, JNU, while sharing her perspective on the fee rollback issue, told Radiance, “The recent movement in JNU against hostel manual has raised many crucial questions, the most fundamentally that of public education, and access and equity in higher education in India. The movement began as a pushback and demand for complete rollback of the new draft hostel manual, which included a massive fee hike, removal of clauses of hostel reservation for marginalised sections and other such clauses.
“Data has revealed that more than 40 per cent of students in JNU will be unable to pay their fees if the new manual is not rolled back. But even at present, most students are struggling to exist in the university, with delayed and insufficient fellowship barely covering the cost of living. In addition, the University is already marked by rampant discrimination in viva voce by faculty against marginalised students (which Abul Nafey Committee Report revealed), an absence of minority deprivation points or minority cells to address any issues of Muslim students on campus, many of whom face the same harassment which Fatima Lateef in IIT Madras went through.”
“This issue of hostel manual has to be seen in this broader framework of social justice in JNU. Rollback of high fees has to be carried out, even if the only response that has come so far from administration and the state is police violence and threats of expulsion. But that is only step one. In order to imagine just, accessible and equitable public education, many things have to be changed and redressed,” said Shayma.
Shariq Ansar of the Fraternity Movement, a students based group, while speaking to Radiance said, “There has been fee hike not only in JNU but in other institutions as well. As per findings of the total 6000 students around 1500 students are from marginalised section. This fee hike is an attempt to stop these weaker and marginalised section from the mainstream and also seen as an effort to impose corporate education model by the government. The issue is not the increase of bed charge from Rs 10 to Rs 200 but can be said to be an idea to destroy the very idea of JNU. JNU provides higher education with high quality with affordable and nominal fees and it is seen as an attempt to destroy all this. Efforts are being made to impose international agenda of education and the present VC of JNU is also hobnobbing with the government in implementing these agendas.”
Earlier, on November 19, JNU students were stopped at Baba Gang Nath Marg when they were trying to march to Parliament and nearly 100 protestors, including students’ union president Aishe Ghosh, were detained. Many protesting students were also injured after being beaten brutally by cops. Visually challenged, Shashi Bhushan Samad, councillor, JNUSU was also brutally beaten up. As per reports, the police stamped his chest with boots and he is reported to be in a critical condition in AIIMS Trauma Centre. Later on, the visually challenged also protested against police manhandling. The JNU Teachers’ Association (JNUTA) condemned the police action. “Police inflicted severe violence on students on several occasions, outside JNU and then at Jor Bagh, which seriously injured many of them. Physically and visually disabled students were also not spared,” JNUTA said in a statement.
Afreen Fatima, JNUSU councillor and former AMU’s Women’s College Students Union President, who was badly injured during protest, told Radiance, “This is a very big issue the students community is facing because most of us may not be able to afford the fee hike. JNU has the data of 40 per cent but I feel that even more, say 50 per cent of the students, in JNU will find it hard to cope up with the increased fee hike. If a family that earns 10 to 12 thousand per month has to pay 8 thousand for one child, it would be very difficult for him. What is important to note here is that the percentage of Dalits, Adivasis, weaker sections and minorities is very less in higher education. If there is no rollback, the percentage will go down further and where will they go now for education if the public education system is not affordable for them.”