Political tensions spill over into violence on campuses

National political tensions in India have spilled over into universities, with numerous incidents on campuses, some of them violent causing injuries and damage to university property. In some cases, campuses have had to be closed, according to an academic freedom report.

The just released report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project cited killings, violence and other types of attacks on campuses and cases of wrongful imprisonment or detention, wrongful dismissal and other types of attacks on scholars.

“In India, political tensions have led to violent altercations between students, security forces, and off-campus groups, and have driven coercive legal actions and disciplinary measures targeting students and academics whose ideas do not align with the ideas of those in power,” the report said.

While many of the incidents reported were one offs, localised or related to specific grievances on and around those campuses, the report notes, “collectively, these incidents raise significant concerns about growing pressures within India’s higher education space, driven by both government actors and significant tensions among campus groups.”

“This trend appears capable of significantly chilling campus expression, and should be met by scholars, students, local governments and Indian society more broadly with a public re-commitment to principles of academic freedom and related values, including institutional autonomy and social responsibility.”

In many cases, the report notes, police actions, including excessive force and arrests, appear to have escalated tensions during demonstrations and violated the rights of student and faculty protesters on campus.

Violent clashes

Among the violent clashes on campuses in the past year was an incident in September 2018 at Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, an agricultural university in West Bengal, when a group of around 100 men attacked students participating in a class boycott and sit-in with iron rods, bamboo sticks and chains. The protesting students were demanding the resignations of administrators who had requested police intervention during an earlier protest. At least 10 students were reportedly injured.

The same month at Mahatma Gandhi Central University in Bihar state, a group of 15 people attacked a student named Shakti Babu in apparent retaliation for his campus activism. Babu had recently posted videos of himself on social media attending a march supporting a professor who had been the victim of a violent attack a few weeks earlier, and had criticised the university’s vice-chancellor.

As he left campus following a meeting with the president of the university’s teachers’ association, Babu was ambushed and attacked. He suffered internal injuries and was hospitalised.

The following month violent clashes broke out during a demonstration at Sharda University in Noida, on the outskirts of Delhi. Ethnic tensions on campus flared following a fight between an Indian student and an Afghan student. The university suspended three students who were allegedly involved in the fight. Hundreds later gathered on campus to demand that the university take more severe action in response to the incident.

Student witnesses reported that the violence was incited by members of a right-wing Hindu extremist group from outside the university. The campus was later closed for three days, and police reportedly filed complaints for rioting against 350 individuals in connection with the protest.

In March this year, members of rival student groups – the Hindu nationalist Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), associated with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, and the Marxist Students’ Federation of India – clashed violently, wielding swords and metal rods, on the campus of Himachal Pradesh University, injuring 17.

Rival political groups also clashed at Delhi University in August when members of the Students’ Federation of India (SFI), affiliated with the Communist Party of India, were confronted by a group of individuals believed to be ABVP members, who attacked the SFI members allegedly using a large stick with nails attached and cricket clubs. Three students were severely injured in the attack.

Attacks on freedom of expression

In several documented cases, university officials in India have retaliated against scholars and students for the content of their academic or political expression through disciplinary measures, including suspension and expulsion, the report noted.

In February 2019, multiple individuals faced retaliation for their public comments in response to a suicide attack in Kashmir in which 40 Indian security personnel were killed.

In February 2019, Papri Banerjee, an assistant professor of English, Icon College of Commerce in Guwahati in Assam state, was suspended for “objectionable remarks” after she posted social media messages calling the attack in Kashmir “an act of cowardice” that “would break the heart of any Indian”, but also apparently claiming that the attack was a response to the violent conduct of Indian security services in Kashmir. On the day she was suspended, Banerjee was also criminally charged with “public mischief”.

Sadaf Rafiq Zaffar, an undergraduate student at Shree Guru Gobind Singh Tricentenary University, in Haryana state also engaged in debates on social media accusing the Indian military of atrocities in Kashmir. On 19 February, more than 500 student protesters demanded her dismissal. The university decided to expel her, reportedly calling the posts “anti-national”.