Last year, it started with the protests at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) after the appointment of the BJP member Gajendra Chauhan as the chairman of the institute. Protest against saffronisation of the institute and a strike of 139 days which started on 12 June, 2015, shook the country. Some students were arrested and strong police action was taken against the protestors.
It just did not end there. We are almost on the half way of 2016, and it has not been quite peaceful. We have already seen university protests over several issues in almost all parts of the country, from Kashmir to Hyderabad. Here are some of the major university protests India faced this year, till now.
HCU row
This year, on 17 January Rohith Vemula who was a Dalit scholar at Hyderabad Central University hanged himself after five students and Vemula were suspended by the institute due to the allegations of assault on a leader of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).
The suicide case of Rohith Vemula led to a series of protests all over the country. Protestors accused that the decision taken by the institute was influenced by the letters of HRD minister Smriti Irani and Union minister Bandaru Dattatreya where they were allegedly stated as "anti-national" and "casteist". The government faced a lot of criticisms and opposition parties demanded the resignation of Smriti Irani and Bandaru Dattatreya.
JNU row
One of the most intense protests this year at a University Campus took place at Jawaharlal Nehru University after Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) members protested against an event held on 9th February which was against the hanging of Afzal Guru, the parliament attack convict of 2001. Allegations of anti-national slogans being raised led to the arrest of JNU Students' Union (JNUSU) president Kanhaiya Kumar and other students, including Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya. Not only that, journalists and students were assaulted at the Patiala House court premises and lawyers thrashed Kanhaiya Kumar when the journalists were present at the spot.
The undying protest took a new turn when allegation were proved that the TV news channels showed doctored videos of students raising anti-national slogans. JNU row was not trapped in the city itself, it soon reached Jadavpur University in Kolkata where the students took out a torch rally against arrest of JNU students.
NIT Srinagar row
After the uproar at JNU in New Delhi, agitations erupted at the National Institute of Technology (NIT) Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir. It started after two groups clashed over Indian cricket team’s defeat in the T20 World Cup match at the hands of West Indies on March 31st. Some Kashmiri students rejoiced after the defeat while the non-Kashmiri students took it as an offence and clashes broke out. Later, on 1st April, non Kashmiri students waved the tricolour shouted slogans like ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’, ‘Hindustan Zindabad’ and ‘Pakistan Murdabad’ on the campus. Whereas the Kashmiri student raised slogans like, ‘Hum Kya Chahte Azadi’. Tarun Vijay, BJP MP lauded the students for teaching a lesson to the ‘separatists’. The authorities had to suspend classes for the rising unrest.
JU row
Recently in Jadavpur University massive clashes broke out in the campus between the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and the members of Students’ Union. The unrest started over the open-air screening of Vivek Agnihotri’s film “Buddha In A Traffic Jam” organised by Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (AVBP). At first, permission was given for the screening but later faced strong resistance from radical students and the permission was withdrawn. Left wing protested because the film misrepresents and tribal resistance against neo-liberal attacks and the attacks on dalits. Amidst all these, accusation of molesting a girl took it to a different turn. Four men, who are supposedly ABVP volunteers, molested the girl and were held by the students. They were handed over to the police by the Vice Chancellor of the University.
AVBP supporters took out a protest rally against the ‘anti-national’ activities in the university, claiming that the university I turning into an anti-national hub. They marched by shouting slogans such as “Bharat Mata ki Jai” and “Doodh mangoge to kheer denge, Kashmir mangoge to cheer denge”