Journalism of Courage
Sending former security officers,civil servants to head institutions like Jamia conveys the wrong message.
Academic fights are so vicious because the stakes are so low,goes the saying. But the discontent over high-level appointments to Muslim-focused institutions like Jamia Millia Islamia and Aligarh Muslim University AMU involves the important question of whether it takes a special kind of person to head them. Rather than persons of academic excellence or experience,the job often goes to former civil servants,police and armymen with a reputation for bringing order to unruly places. The Jamia teachers union has written to the prime minister,asking for its new vice chancellor to come from an academic background,as specified in UGC guidelines.
The point is not that these individuals lack the capacity to helm these institutions a VCs role is largely about competent institutional leadership,and sensitivity for academic concerns is more important than a stellar research resume. However,there is no denying the unseemliness of appointing people who represent the power of the state to head Muslim-dominated institutions of higher learning. Consider the idea of such appointments being made to other prestigious Central universities,like Delhi University or Jawaharlal Nehru University,to deal with student unions or difficult faculties. Why should Jamia or AMU be seen through a different prism? The search committees of these universities should ponder the optics of their decisions more seriously.
