Opinion More beefs

When political forces attempt to infiltrate academic institutions, the role of the vice chancellor assumes crucial importance. Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) would not have exploded if the vice chancellor, M. Jagadesh Kumar, had done his duty, barred access to the police, and dealt with the situation in a transparent manner, using the university’s administration. AMU has been more fortunate — its vice chancellor, the retired army officer Zameer Uddin Shah, has spoken clearly about “simmering discontent” at political attempts to limit the autonomy of educational institutions. He has distinguished between anti-national activities and dissidence, and defended the latter as a democratic right. This was a reaction to a letter from BJP MP Satish Gautam, who had urged him not to allow “anti-national and anti-government” events on campus. Again, they are not the same thing, and someone who cannot tell them apart may be out of place in Parliament.

Responsibly, Shah has tried to minimise these trumped-up controversies over beef, women and anti-nationals by insisting that the only issue which stirs his students is the question of AMU’s minority status. The government changed its stance in January on the basis of a technical point, negating the promise of inclusiveness on which it had come to power. The fishing expeditions launched into the campus by the city’s mayor and an MP, both of the BJP, could be flanking attacks that must be strongly resisted. A major centre of learning from the latter half of the 19th century, AMU has symbolic value like JNU. Though one out of three of its students is not Muslim, it stands for the liberal Muslim community, while JNU represents left-liberal academia. Such institutions have special significance, and their autonomy must not be compromised.