Students go on indefinite hunger strike; Agashe adopts a hard stance

PUNE, February 10: Even as mediating former students - director Saeed Mirza and renowned cameramen Birendra Saini and K K Mahajan - drove in...

PUNE, February 10: Even as mediating former students – director Saeed Mirza and renowned cameramen Birendra Saini and K K Mahajan – drove into the Film and Television Institute of India premises this evening, agitating students decided to go on an indefinite hunger strike to protest against the Governing Council’s non-implementation of the Minister of Information and Broadcasting Jaipal Reddy’s promises made to them about a month back.

There was an air of tension at the premier FTII campus this evening as students sent a notice to the Deccan Gymkhana police station informing them about the decision to go on a hunger strike and dean, Films, Mehboob Khan, sent one to students saying "your proposed act will not be permitted within the institute premises."

"We will not permit a hunger strike within the campus because that is not one of the objectives and trainings of this institution," declared a worked-up Agashe, renting his ire on members of the press, promising that he would harden his stand since a softattitude had not helped him solve the issue in a biased manner.

"The problem with students is that they cannot take no for an answer," he said, quoting a paradox that last year students had gone on a strike because the GC had overruled the Academic Council recommendations and this year because they wanted the GC to overrule the AC recommendations on a zero semester and giving faculty time to whet the revised syllabus.

Agashe also hinted at political inclinations of the students who had garnered letters of support from organisations like Sahmat, the trust started by the late Safdar Hashmi in Delhi, and the Jawaharlal Nehru University. "Some points need to be investigated," he said, "for instance, who is their (students’) lawyer? Is it academic support they are gathering? People who are being used to put pressure, what do they know about this institute?."

"I am not a political person. If political weapons have to be used to resolve an academic problem, I am not interested," he declared.

Students,meanwhile, maintained that the institute could not stop a student from staying hungry in him room if he wanted to, expressing fear that a postponement of another 15 days in taking a decision on the "zero session"would automatically spell out one as this was the time when forms were filled for the year’s new courses. "It is a residential campus, how can they stop a hunger strike," reasoned Kavita Pai, president, Student Union.

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Twenty students were released from custody yesterday on bail. They had been arrested a day back and charged under section 143, 341, 342 and 506 of the IPC dealing with unlawful assembly, illegal detention and threat to life.

Visitors, press barred

With its gates blocked by a stern metal bar, that is being lifted only to let students and faculty pass, the FTII wears a decidedly unfriendly look for visitors.Implemented yesterday, the new regulations do not allow students to have any visitors inside the campus, including the press. Agashe, with a characteristic outburst, pouredhis ire on journalists wanting to know why this had been done. "Don’t ask me such insensitive questions, am I not a human being, and are you not aware of the circumstances prevailing in FTII,?" he thundered, equating the queries to "routine questioning of rape victims," which he was fighting against.

He said his faculty "who were academicians and not fighting people" wereworking in an atmosphere of fear. The director also informed that he did not want outsiders coming in because "a certain person had been going around the campus telling people that he was there to teach students how to conduct a strike."