AISA Activists House Arrest, On Modi’s DU Visit
The student branch of the CPI-ML, AISA (All India Students Organization), said on Friday that its members were “detained” inside their apartments and were not permitted to leave since the morning of 30th June, the day of PM Narendra Modi’s visit to the north campus of Delhi University.
Although Delhi Police has denied any such detention took place but the photographs provided by both Anjali, AISA DU Secretary and Abhigyan, AISA Delhi State President tells a different story. Both of them were under police surveillance since morning and in one of the photographs Police can be seen sitting inside their flat.
“Anjali and I have been imprisoned in our flat and are not permitted to see the university due to the PM’s visit”, Abhigyan, president of AISA Delhi, remarked. No warrant or order was shown from the side of the police and we have no information on how long they will keep us under house arrest, he added.
PM Modi was invited as the Chief guest on Delhi University’s Centenary Celebrations. Dharmendra Pradhan, the Education Minister of India was also present at the event. The celebrations took place in the sports complex of Delhi University.
Incidents Before Modi’s Visit
A live streaming of Modi’s speech was organized in every DU college and the principals of different colleges circulated a notice making it compulsory for students to be present during the live stream and rewarded 5 days of attendance to the present students. In Hindu college, a similar notice was circulated with an added point, barring students from wearing black clothes.
For the preparation, the one-day prior holiday of Eid-ul-Adha was cancelled for professors who do not celebrate Eid and in many colleges professors were to be compulsorily present in the college on the 29th of June. Students who volunteered in the preparations were also asked to be present on campus. DU professors went ahead with a public notice calling out the ‘selective nature’ of DU VC and called this move a discrimination against religious minorities on the campus.
Many student organizations including AISA, condemned both the notice, one which made it mandatory for students to watch the live stream and another asking professors and students to be present on campus on 29th June through their social media accounts.
AISA also put up posters on the campus and nearby areas asking Prime Minister Modi questions on the degradation of education, fee hike, syllabus change, removal of papers on Ambedkar, Gandhi, Gender and Caste and many more. These posters were removed by the administration and ABVP members the very next morning.
Online Protest Call
While activists were under house arrest and students watched the live stream of PM Modi in their respective colleges a parallel online protest was called upon by the Democratic Teachers Front (DTF), many student organizations joined in, AISA being one of them. Students shared photos holding placards that asked questions to Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the hashtag of GoBackModi. These questions included Manipur Violence, Fee hikes in central universities, Discrimination against Minorities, Rise in unemployment, DU Ad-hoc professors thrown out of their jobs and on Death of Professor Samarveer among others.
While PM Modi was seen interacting with the youth of the country during his metro travel to the University campus, the contrary coming to the campus students were given no platform to raise questions to their own Prime Minister.
Thus the online protest was also a way of asking questions to Modi and a way to ask for accountability with a demand to break PM’s silence, the students made it very clear that the campus and the country are under a ruckus and they will not let politicians use their campus just for the propaganda, unless they don’t answer, they are not welcome.
