“Don’t take benefit of reservations, if you can’t pay back”

By Gomathi Kumar & Sanjay Kabir


Dr. Umakant (b. 1970) is a well known Dalit activist and scholar and has represented Dalit cause at various levels. After his schooling in home state Bihar, Dr Umakant joined Delhi University and later Jawaharlal Nehru University for higher education. In the year 2000, he was awarded doctorate for his thesis ‘Human Rights of Dalits: A Case Study of Bihar (1977-1997)’. In JNU, he was one of the founder members of a Dalit student platform UDSF and later has worked with National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR), Indian Institute of Dalit Studies (IIDS) and International Dalit Solidarity Network (IDSN). He also co-edited a book titled ‘Caste, Race and Discrimination: Discourses in International Context’ (2004).


Illustration by Rajesh Kumar, JNU, New Delhi

For almost two decades now, you have been participating in the Dalit movement, first as a student activist and later as representing our cause at many national and international fora together with leading various campaigns for Dalit rights, how did you first get exposed to the Dalit movement and when?

My exposure to the Dalit movement started quite early. I got introduced to the Ambedkarite movement and philosophy at home itself thanks to my father who was very passionate for the cause. He introduced me to the literature published by BAMCEF, DS4 and BSP in my school days itself. However, my direct participation in the movement started in 1988, from my graduation days, when I came to Delhi and joined the Department of Political Science, Hindu college for my BA (Honours).

At that time our students were scattered and had no organisation or forum to come together, even informally. I started interacting with the Dalit students and tried to organize them, not by forming any separate organisation, but by bringing them together on certain issues. However, my participation increased in 1990 when the anti-Mandal agitation against OBC reservation took place and Delhi University became its main centre.

What was the impact of anti-OBC reservation agitation of 1990 on the Dalit students? Being a conscious Dalit student what was your response?

Lot of problems started cropping up for our students during that period. Though the Mandal commission recommendations were aimed at OBCs but it was the Dalit students who were being targeted by ‘upper’ castes. Our students were being victimised, ridiculed and things really became very difficult for us in the campus. The prejudices against us were always there but this agitation gave the ‘upper’ caste students an opportunity to display them quite openly.

It was very difficult to be a Dalit student in Delhi University during that period. Therefore I felt the need of meeting all our students not only from SC and ST backgrounds but also the OBCs, to instill a sense of self-respect and not to feel demoralized due to ‘upper’ caste students’ castiest behaviour. Soon we were able to form a small group and started interacting with our students telling them not to get provoked unnecessarily but whenever there was a need, to give a befitting reply to the anti-reservationists and if they resort to physical violence, to get united and defend themselves.

During this agitation we came across many cases of violence against Dalit students carried out mainly by lumpen caste-Hindu students belonging to feudal backgrounds from UP and Bihar. Thankfully in our college nothing of that sort happened but the whole situation during anti-Mandal agitation taught me the urgency of organizing Dalit students. In 1991, I joined Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi for my master’s programme and became much more active in the movement.

You spent almost a decade in JNU as a student right from your post-graduation to doctorate. This campus has a wonderful history of Dalit student activism. What was your experience there and how did it shape your post-student life?

When I joined JNU, Dalit students here also were trying to organize themselves. I immediately teamed up with them and as a result United Dalit Students’ Forum (UDSF) came into existence in 1991. I was one of its founding members and that is where my real involvement with the Dalit student’s issues began and we got enough opportunities to sharpen ourselves, to become articulative and develop leadership skills. However, the best thing with UDSF was the concept of collective leadership in the sense that it was run by a central committee consisting of 6-10 members. No single person was allowed to take the credit. There is always a central committee and collective responsibility that actually lends much credit to an organization like UDSF. Also it helps to develop leadership qualities among our students.

UDSF was the best platform I had. I could become Dalit activist and do international advocacy at different United Nations (UN) bodies only because of my initial training as a member of UDSF. I feel happy that in such a short period I have contributed something for our cause and the entire credit goes to UDSF.

A Dalit student platform is notably absent in majority of Indian campuses. As a frontrunner and a possible role model, what were the main activities of UDSF?

In UDSF, we did many things right from writing pamphlets, making posters on Dalit issues, to writing memorandums, organizing public meetings and building campaigns on different issues both in JNU and outside. We ran study circle classes and organised public talks by inviting noted scholars like Eleanor Zelliot, Gail Omvedt and Owen Lynch - scholars who have done extensive work on Dalits. Then we had our scholars like Prof Kancha Ilaiah, Prof S.K. Thorat, Prof Jogdand and Dr. Ramaiah as our regular speakers. We had regular organisational meetings and used to participate in other public meetings also to raise our issues. Through these activities, we forced other political groups to take up our issues too.

The common perception is that students should not involve themselves in any activities other than studies. For Dalit students the dangers are much more given their weak socio-economic background. What are your thoughts on this?

I disagree. People don’t have an iota of idea about the need and importance of platforms like UDSF in all Indian campuses. Let me tell you very categorically, all active members of UDSF from my batch are more successful professionally than those who chose to remain confined in their rooms. They are now in academics, in bureaucracy; some of them have even become full time activists. You can check this yourself.

They are successful because of the work they did in UDSF and the training they received there. It benefited them a lot in terms of exposure on different issues of our community and to develop interpersonal skills. Working for UDSF gave them a very confident public persona that is prerequisite for one’s professional success. Given the prejudices and hostile campus environment such platforms are the only source for Dalit students to express themselves, have access to information, draw support from each other and become socially conscious members of the community.

Most of the Dalit students who were active in UDSF in their JNU days are still contributing to the movement in different ways. That is the real success of our organisation. It not only helps you in your career but also makes you grounded with Ambedkarite philosophy so that wherever you go, you are aware of your duties towards the community. We need such Dalit student platform in each and every Indian campus and then you will see how things change rapidly in this country.

What are the major achievements of UDSF while you were in JNU that you cherish?

One achievement of UDSF, which I really cherish the most, happened in the year 2000 and had country-wide implications. In that particular year, University Grant Commission (UGC) came out with the decision that there would be no reservations for SC and ST students in Mphil and PhD programmes in the Central Universities.

That was an arbitrary decision, clearly aimed to curb any chance of our students for pursuing higher education. Given the level of caste-prejudices and weak socio-economic status, it is almost impossible for a student from SC/ST background to get admission in these premier institutions without reservation.

UDSF immediately took up this issue and started lobbying with different students’ groups and organizing Dalit students in the JNU campus. We met various cabinet ministers, members of parliament including HRD Minister Murali Manohar Joshi. We also tried to contact Dalit students from all over the country. The efforts of UDSF were remarkable in the sense that not many were aware of such decision and if UGC was allowed to go ahead, then it was the end of the road for SC/ST students for long time to come.

Due to our constant agitation and lobbying, the matter was taken up in the Cabinet meeting. There Ram Vilas Paswan (then a cabinet minister), with whom we lobbied hard, played a major role in putting the issue in right perspective. Within a week of our agitation and lobbying we got the order cancelled. I believe this is the biggest victory for UDSF till date. We fought really hard and won, benefiting thousands of Dalit students across the country.

Another important incident of my UDSF days dates back to 1994, when JNU was celebrating its Silver Jubilee after completing 25 years of its formation and having established its credentials as the bastion of progressive thoughts and ideology. We chose this particular occasion to highlight the hollowness of such claims.

What were the exact concerns raised by UDSF on this occasion?

UDSF initiated a campaign titled ‘what JNU has given to Dalit and Adivasis in the last 25 years’. We prepared the fact-sheet about how many SC and ST teachers have been appointed, how many students admitted and what percentage of SC/ST reservation has been fulfilled in JNU admissions in this period. As expected, despite all its progressive pretensions, JNU was woefully short of fulfilling its constitutional and social obligations.

We prepared posters with these facts and figures and posted in the entire campus. The then President Shankar Dayal Sharma was to inaugurate the function. We went there with black flags, posters, banners saying that JNU has not done justice to us. It created huge flutter and the programme got cancelled. Later, if you see, many teaching positions that were lying vacant were filled up with SC/ST candidates. Such was the impact of our campaign.

Apart from raising Dalit students’ issues in the campus and outside, how did UDSF involve itself with the concerns of larger Dalit community?

Our students were always very keen on raising the issue of caste-based violence. UDSF itself came into existence due to Tsunduru Dalit massacre (Andhra Pradesh, 1991), where 8 Dalits were hacked to death. Then Dalit students felt the need of a platform to show their solidarity to the larger Dalit community as well as to put pressure on the government to punish the perpetrators.

If you notice, 1990s’ was the decade with maximum violence against Dalit community, especially in the rural areas. Almost every year there were incidents where Dalits were massacred for asserting themselves. UDSF, within its limitation, responded by organizing protests in and out of the campus, by sending fact-finding teams, organizing relief to the victims and sensitizing the campus through public talks and meetings.

Here I will like to mention one such incident. In 1998, 61 Dalits were brutally killed by the ‘upper’ caste landlords in Lakshmanpur Bathe, Bihar. I was preparing for my civil services exams together with one of my batch mates Ravindra Kumar (at present faculty in IGNOU, New Delhi). We came to know about this incident on our last day of UPSC Mains exams. That whole night we spent organizing our students from one hostel to another.

On the very next day we held big demonstration inside the campus against the killings and took UDSF delegation to various government authorities in Delhi. Then our team went to Lakshmanpur Bathe and later published a fact-finding report and sent it to the President, Prime Minister together with other concerned authorities demanding severe punishment for the killers. Through our campaign, we tried to highlight the gravity of the crime and applying pressure on the authorities to provide justice. Again it was Ram Vilas Paswan (cabinet minister in then I.K. Gujaral government) who responded very well and undertook maximum efforts to bring relief to the community.

1990s was also the period of political assertion by Dalits. Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) was on ascendancy and for the first time Dalits were entering into electoral politics as independent players rather than puppets in the hands of the dominant castes. JNU has vibrant student politics and its students’ union elections are keenly watched. Did Dalit students tried to enter into electoral politics there?

UDSF is a non-political platform in the sense that it does not contest students’ union elections. During its formation, we deemed necessary that it should be like this only as we needed a common platform to raise our issues. We wanted to have participation of each and every Dalit students on our platform, irrespective of his/her political leanings.

But we were aware of the importance of electoral politics too and were much influenced and inspired by the political gains made by BSP. So we started Bahujan Student Front (BSF) in 1994. It was separate from UDSF but many of us worked for both. The idea behind the formation of BSF was that JNU student elections are the best platform to bring concerns and issues of our community in open. As you pointed out rightly that JNUSU elections are covered in media through out the country and has some resonance outside the campus, therefore we formed BSF and contested elections.

I contested, in 1995, for the post of general secretary as BSF candidate. Though we lost the election, which was expected, but we were able to set the agenda of the elections. The whole students’ union election was fought around Dalit issues and for the first time our issues and concerns were debated in JNU campus. We had wonderful speakers like our presidential candidate Dr. M.P. Rana (presently a full time activist) who were able to catapult Dalit issues in the mainstream.

It was such an important event in JNU history and the best part was that we did this on our own, without any external support unlike other students groups who could maintain their presence because of their mentors outside. Though we lost the elections but the entire student community was very charged up and we received lots of encouragement from the students from marginalized sections.

BSF stood in JNUSU elections for 2-3 more years but as you know electoral politic has its own compulsion and many of us were also reaching to a point where academic accomplishment becomes an important factor. Given our weak socio-economic backgrounds we have to be very conscious of this fact and can’t take many liberties as for not only our immediate family but for many others we are the only hope for their better future.

Thanks so much for enlightening us and we are sure that your experience in JNU campus as a student activist will inspire many. But when we look at the larger picture, we get hugely disappointed. The Dalit movement has, so far, not emerged at the national level as a force to reckon with. What are the challenges towards that?

It is quite natural. Like the fragmentation in Indian society, Dalits are also divided into different groups. Like you, I also wish for pan-India Dalit movement and have been quite agitated for the lack of it. Once, I asked Prof Eleanor Zelliot, who is a well known authority on Dalit issues, about why there is no pan-India Dalit organisation or movement. I will like to quote her exact answer here.

She said, “India is like Europe. Every region has its own culture, own language. Most of these regions have very strong local Dalit movements but the problem is that these movements are not able to transcend their local barriers, regional barriers. So you will find that in Tamilnadu, or in some parts of Tamilnadu there is a strong movement but the people of neighbouring states like Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra are not aware of it at all. Even in these states there might be grassroots or even state level movements but they have no linkages with their counterparts in Tamilnadu. That is how Dalit movement has remained fragmented region wise, language wise and it is so difficult to bring them all on one national platform without transcending these barriers.”

Ideally our people should have been very well organised after 60 years of independence and our intelligentsia developed enough to play a larger role in mainstreaming our issues. There is huge disappointment in terms of our political leadership too. Instead of having one strong political platform we have many with huge differences among each other. Even in terms of our social organisations and NGOs, we seem not to have one network through which their work could be coordinated, at least on similar issues.

But 60 years is lot of time for a movement to emerge at national level?

Perhaps for country like India, working for 20, 30 and even 40 years is not enough to bring pan-India change or even to have a pan-Indian identity for one organisation. Because of the diversity in the language, culture; it is very difficult to bring people together on one platform. Then Dalits themselves are not a homogeneous group and are divided in hundreds of castes themselves. It further complicates the matter.

It is not that attempts have not been made in this direction. In fact, in last 30 years, there have been various efforts for a pan-India Dalit organisation. The role of Kanshiram Saheb in organizing Dalits and other disadvantaged communities on one political platform was momentous. Today BSP is a party to reckon with and has presence in many states along with clear majority in one of the biggest and most populous state of the country. But you see the amount of hard work it required for Kanshiram Saheb to bring BSP up to this level. He gave his whole life for it.

We do not have very strong economic background and also lack social and cultural capital in terms of generating financial resources to run our organisations. To have a successful all India organisations you need crores of rupees. From where will you get this much money? Who will give you?

It is now that you will hear few Dalit NGOs getting decent fundings for their activities from the funding agencies. After 20-25 years of long struggle these NGOs are able to come up and locate some funding opportunities and many of them are doing commendable work at different levels.

Do you see any role of Dalit students’ activism, like that of UDSF, towards creating a pan-India Dalit movement?

There is strong need of some genuine efforts to create a pan-India Dalit movement. It will not happen automatically and that is where the Dalit students’ activism at premier institutions like JNU becomes important as these institutions have students from different states and through organisations like UDSF that represents all Dalit students, one can learn to transcend regional barriers.

However, it is also important to keep in mind that student life in campuses like JNU might not reflect the ground realities in totality and our training remains incomplete till we go out and work in the larger society. It is very important for a Dalit student activist to understand this fact because the idealism that fires your imagination, your spirit might not match with the ground realities. You might not find strong Dalit organisations at different levels or unity among our people.

But if you are really sincere towards the cause, you can make whole lot of difference. You have to take initiatives. Either you take up issues in your own way or become a full time activist by either joining any social or political platform or NGOs working on our issues and contribute there with your best intentions. You will have to sacrifice a lot because fighting for Dalit rights is not an easy job. It might not pay you politically, socially or economically. If you are determined to work for your people, nothing will stop you from raising the issue, getting justice for our community. What is needed is a team of dedicated young people with good professional background and good training. With only rhetorics we will not go very far.

After completing studies, you have been associated with organisations working for our cause and participated in various campaigns for Dalit rights both at national and international level. One of them was Durban Conference, held in 2001. This conference is often credited for bringing global attention, for the first time, to the issue of caste-discrimination in India. You participated in this conference along with many other Dalit activists. What had been your experience there?

The World Conference against Racism (WCAR) at Durban, in my opinion, was the first ever international event where Dalit activists could successfully participate and bring international attention to the caste discrimination. Creating visibility on the issue was our only goal and we had fair success in doing so. If the Dalits activists had not participated there in large numbers our issues would never have appeared at the international level as prominently as they appear now.

National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) worked as a catalyst for this campaign. It not only mobilized Dalit activists from across the country but took the campaign to different levels simultaneously – from grassroots to international forums. While we were lobbying at Durban, we were also organizing rallies, yatras in different states inside the country demanding Dalit human rights.

In Durban, we were almost at par with African and Palestinian groups in organizing and highlighting our issues. The leader of our Dalit group was even invited to address 12 heads of states that included prominent politicians like Yasar Arafat, Fidel Castro and Thabo Mbeki.

It was a remarkable achievement given the complete lack of exposure of Dalit activists in international advocacy and campaigns. It is an important milestone in the Dalit movement as it brought global attention to caste discrimination. Now we are able to intervene in different UN bodies as well on various Dalit issues. Before Durban, UN bodies never paid attention to our problem. Just after Durban, Committee on Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) organised a thematic discussion on descent based discrimination. There, for the first time, any UN document mentioned the word ‘caste’! That’s how we could make a difference.

Highlighting the issue and making every one aware about caste discrimination at global level is very well but no international forum can directly intervene as caste is an ‘internal matter’ of the country. In such scenario, how beneficial international advocacy would be to the Dalits living in this country?

On the face of it, all these exercises may seem useless and to certain extent it is true. Going to UN and raising issue at international fora do not help you much, we know this. We never said that the participation in Durban conference will solve all your problems. But it certainly helps in creating conditions where you can demand accountability from the Indian state.

At the Durban conference our strategy was to create visibility on our issues and we did that quite successfully. After the conference, we tried to consolidate on the gains made at international level by taking up advocacy on Dalit issues at various other international fora. Also we never limited ourselves to international advocacy but are working at different levels. The unwritten motto of NCDHR is ‘we will work from village panchayats to UN level’.

So along with international advocacy we stated working on strategies to capacitate young Dalit activists to work at grassroots level. More than seventeen hundred young Dalit activists from all over the country were given trainings to fight against cases of caste atrocities. They are trained for monitoring atrocity cases, compiling data, preparing the fact finding reports on such cases and then support Dalit victims through legal interventions. Through these activists we are also able to create a big data bank on the number of atrocities and its various forms which later could be used to demand for Dalit rights and to lobby for strong intervention from both the state and international bodies. The grassroots information has helped us in raising the issue in most effective way.

After Durban Conference, what have been the other achievements in international advocacy?

I will like to mention here about the appointment of two Special Rapporteurs, in 2005, by the UN to study caste discrimination and to prepare guidelines for tackling it. Unfortunately the UN body that appointed them got abolished during the restructuring of UN and the Rapporteurs have yet to present their reports, which are now hanging somewhere in the UN building in Geneva. We are lobbying hard to get them published so that we can at least use them as a tool to address our issues.

Then there was a conference organised in Geneva by Human Rights Council on April 10, 2008 where Indian government had to face international censure for not dealing effectively with caste discrimination. Here we submitted our report on caste discrimination and lobbied with the delegations from different countries to raise questions on the status of Dalits in the conference. In just two days, we met and presented our case to missions from about twenty countries.

You know how many of them raised our issue? Eleven of them. Indian government had to take notice and to reiterate its commitment to protect Dalit rights at the conference. This happened not because of two days of lobbying but due to our regular interventions at international levels. After Durban conference, we have used every opportunity to raise various issues on international fora - atrocities on Dalit women, untouchability, manual scavenging, lack of equal opportunities, poverty, discrimination in natural disaster relief and rehabilitations etc. Thus, most of the countries who value human rights are well aware of the caste problem and are willing to support us in pressuring Indian government to implement strict measures to empower Dalits.

Prior to the Durban Conference, were there any similar attempts to draw the global attention towards the problems faced by the Dalits?

It seems, in 1945, Babasaheb Ambedkar tried to take caste issue at international level. There is a reference in Babasaheb’s writings (Writings and Speeches Vol. 17) but what actually happened, we are not aware. Perhaps there was a conspiracy to stop Babasaheb to go to UN.

In 1945 when the League of Nations was preparing for the formal establishment of UN, there were many marginalized groups from different part of the world that were trying to submit memorandums so that their concerns also get reflected in Universal Declaration of Human rights and in other international treaties that were coming up. At Durban, we got to know that there were exchange of letters between Babasaheb Ambedkar and prominent Afro-American leader W. E. B. Du Bois. The Black leader wrote in his biography that, “I received a letter from Dr Ambedkar, leader of untouchables from India to coordinate together to submit a memorandum”.

After the death of Babasaheb few brave attempts were made to lobby international support against caste discrimination in the country. The efforts of Dr. Laxmi Berwa (USA), Advocate Bhagwan Das (Delhi) and Henry Thayagraj (Chennai) must be highly appreciated by all of us in this regard. However, these were at best individual efforts and it is for the first time, in Durban Conference, caste issues were raised in a very systematic way in UN bodies.

After Durban Conference and getting exposed on caste issues at international level, what have been the responses of Government of India?

At least the Government of India now has started admitting the problem that yes there is some thing called caste-discrimination. Earlier they were not even doing that and kept on reiterating that caste problem is now our past. Now they are saying that we will take up the issue seriously and we will get things done inside the country. The problem is these pronouncements should also reflect in the implementation which still is not happening. For us it is going to be a long battle so that state is held accountable for all the atrocities that are committed on us.

Despite having an egalitarian Constitution and wonderful set of anti-discriminatory laws why the state is unable to implement them?

The problem lies at the way things are done at Government level. Babasaheb used to say that Manu is still alive in this country. People who are at the helm of affairs are still following manu-wad. That is why our people are having a miserable life even after 60 years of independence. Anti-discriminatory Laws and progressive constitutional provisions do not operate in vacuum. These are operating within a caste-society that does not recognize the Indian Constitution. The brahmanical social order does not recognize it. This social order decides the behaviour of dominant caste groups in our country – be it caste-Hindus, caste-Muslims, or caste-Christians.

And when such people constitute majority of those who are at helm of affairs of this country, how can there be any socio-economic change? That is why it is important for us to create a space in the decision making process and in governance of the country. One or two Dalit persons can never bring change. With one chairperson of some government body, one planning commission member or one member in the cabinet here and there, things are not going to happen. We need to mainstream Dalit rights and concerns every where, in every sector.

You have almost two decades of activism behind you starting right from your student life to representing the Dalit cause at various fora. What are your expectations from the Dalit students now?

We need people who are willing to work for liberating our community. We do not need people who have problems in identifying themselves as Dalits. Every person who has benefited from the reservation policy has the moral duty to pay back to the society. Don’t take benefit of reservations if you can’t pay back. You are being immoral otherwise. If there was no reservation, we would not have been here, talking to each other. You have also no rights to take reservation benefits if you are unable to defend the policy. Let’s be clear and honest to ourselves.

I feel proud to say that I am a product of reservation policy. It would not have been possible for me to get such a good education without it. Without good education, it would have been impossible for me to become an advocate of Dalit rights. My father was the first beneficiary of reservation and he struggled much to provide education not only to his children but to other relatives too. This is what every first generation beneficiary has done.

If you see around carefully, you will realize that most of educated Dalits from our parent’s generation had helped so many people, not just their own families. Every one who has benefited has paid back more than what they were supposed to. They have done their best, they have paid back to the community and it is now our responsibility to pay back.

[Gomathi Kumar and Sanjay Kabir did their Masters of Social Work (MSW) from Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai in the session 2007-09]

http://blog.insightyv.com/?p=905
courtesy: Insight Young Voice,

Rahul Gandhi and Bal Thackery (Language or Caste)

Siva Sena recently said that Bombay is for Marathi speaking population. Most of the subaltern would say the same that is the reason Siva Sena also says it. Still I would like to remind him the last census of Maharstrar says that Bhangi population is urbanized and they are considered to be under “other wokers”. Maharastra gazetter says that Bhangi are migrants from Gujarat. Utleast most of us know that Bhangi population is a “Scavenging” population. The secret is they are not Marathi speaking population but they are Hindi speaking population. Therefore Siva Sena should know that his “Shit” for ages has been cleaned not by Marathis but Hindi speaking population. Hence, before saying Mumbai belongs to Marthi speaking population let his family come and starts doing scavenging across Mumbai first and let him say the slogan.
Rahul Gandhi said “Mumbai belongs to all”, as a reply to Siva Sena VHP. Basically it can be said the other way too, Mumbai belongs to all Caste and groups. Let us rewind back to Gandhi (“Mahatma”), who said all jobs are equal in status. But actually both Rahul and Gandhi say the same idea again that all people are equal. But what actually happens is pathetic. As I said above the Scavenging in Maharastra is done only by one particular community for ages. Therefore, if we have to encounter Rahul Gandhi then we should ask him then why scavenging is done only by Hindi speaking Bhangi community(Dalit) rather than Gandhi family or Siva Sena. Hence fore it is also a castist remark.
If Rahul agrees for Siva Sena then May be all the upper castes and Brahmins will force Rahul and his family to clean the Marathi shit first.
This is what congress is doing for decades together stating all are equal and still practices untouchability. This is the truth for an example if everyone is equal then why should Rahul Gandhi go the UP Dalits house and eat food, does it mean he doesn’t have food. It shows that Rahul will fight for Dalits (utleast he says). Whatsoever, Dalits in UP became aware of this and started closing the doors because telling like this so much food has been stole by people who say we are with you. So recently they started to keep the doors closed because only little food left, which they cannot get cheated by Rahul Gandhi.

His Unmatured political comments:
Recently, Rahul Gandhi visisted one of the Muslim University and said In india any person can become PM, unless and untill he is capable of holding such a big post. Therefore he mentioned Manmohan Sing as an example. If this is what he said did it really mean that in Muslim community and Dalit communities there are no any “most proficient person” to hold the position. Or did he mean to say that anyone who can be a puppet in the hands of national politician can become an Indian PM. This is the only reason Ms. Mayawati is not capable for congress to consider her as a PM candidates, because she cannot be a puppet in the so-called Congress regime.

(“A Muslim can become the Prime Minister provided he is the most proficient person for it, he added” Abstract: http://blog.taragana.com/politics/2009/12/07/competent-muslim-can-become-pm-says-rahul-gandhi-5252/)

With the above comment he escaped.
But the next time he was asked to apologize
“Apparently to woo Muslim students, the son of Congress president Sonia Gandhi reportedly said, “India can change only if Gujarat changed first.”
The students created ruckus accusing the scion of the Nehru-Gandhi family of doing politics in university campus. They asked him to abstain from making political utterances and that the campus was not a platform for such meetings.
Gandhi had to apologize as Congress leaders present at the venue failed to calm down the angry students. He, finally, had to leave the campus as students refused to listen to him.”
Source: http://newshyderabad.wordpress.com/2010/02/02/students-force-rahul-gandhi-to-flee-campus/


Rape Case against him:
“ Rahul Gandhi, Parliament Member of India, Congress Member, All India Congress Party General Secretary, representing the youth of Congress Party - involved in rape of a girl, On 3rd December 2006, Rahul Gandhi was camping at Amethi along with 7 others including 4 foreigners (two from Britain and other two from Italy, names not known). Around 9 P.M all of them were drinking liquor at a V.I.P. guest house in a high security zone. They had an uninvited guest; a young girl named Sukanya Devi, 24 years of age, 1a staunch follower of Nehru-Gandhi family and daughter of Congress worker Balram Singh. Sukanya was looking for an opportunity to meet Rahul Gandhi since last two years and on that fateful night she able to meet him. Sukanya's family has been supporting the Congress party since the time of Nehru. When she met Rahul he spoke to her for a couple of minutes and later he and his friends offered her liquor. Sukanya was amazed seeing all this, she was not feeling comfortable, she refused to have liquor and took permission to leave, but she was forced to stay back and drink. She kept resisting, but they raped her one by one. She cried for help, but her cries fell on deaf ears.”

(http://ratevin.com/story.php?title=Rahul_Sukanya_Amethi_Rahul_Gandhi_Sukanya_Case_In_Amethi)

This is not a new thing to be said about a high profile politician, because in India there are many such rapes done by politician and cover it up. So there are many sukanya’s in our country, who do not know where to go? The above case may be true or Not but still even if it is true can we think that Congress will punish Rahul for the matters.

The other side of Gandhi

Gandhi nearly killed ‘Indian women’ ! Thanks to Hindu Code bill


Following are the excerpts from the international Daily Gaurdian…

George Orwell, in his 1949 essay Reflections on Gandhi, said that “saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent”. If only.

Gandhi despised his own sexual desires, and despised sex in any context except for procreation. He preached that the failure to control carnal urges led to complaints including constipation. He believed that sex was bad for the health of an individual, and that sexual freedom would lead Indians to failure as a people. He sought to consign his nation to what Martin Luther called “the hell of celibacy”. He took his own celibacy vow unilaterally, without consulting his wife.

His view of the female body was warped. As accounted by Rita Banerji, in her book Sex and Power, “he believed menstruation was a manifestation of the distortion of a woman’s soul by her sexuality”.

During Gandhi’s time as a dissident in South Africa, he discovered a male youth had been harassing two of his female followers. Gandhi responded by personally cutting the girls’ hair off, to ensure the “sinner’s eye” was “sterilised”. Gandhi boasted of the incident in his writings, pushing the message to all Indians that women should carry responsibility for sexual attacks upon them. Such a legacy still lingers. In the summer of 2009, colleges in north India reacted to a spate of sexual harassment cases by banning women from wearing jeans, as western-style dress was too “provocative” for the males on campus.

Gandhi believed Indian women who were raped lost their value as human beings. He argued that fathers could be justified in killing daughters who had been sexually assaulted for the sake of family and community honour. He moderated his views towards the end of his life. But the damage was done, and the legacy lingers in every present-day Indian press report of a rape victim who commits suicide out of “shame”. Gandhi also waged a war against contraceptives, labelling Indian women who used them as whores.

Like all men who wage a doomed war with their own sexual desires, Gandhi’s behaviour around females would eventually become very, very odd. He took to sleeping with naked young women, including his own great-niece, in order to “test” his commitment to celibacy. The habit caused shock and outrage among his supporters. God knows how his wife felt.

Gandhi cemented, for another generation, the attitude that women were simply creatures that could bring either pride or shame to the men who owned them. Again, the legacy lingers. India today, according to the World Economic Forum, finds itself towards the very bottom of the gender equality index. Indian social campaigners battle heroically against such patriarchy. They battle dowry deaths. They battle the honour killings of teenage lovers. They battle Aids. They battle female foeticide and the abandonment of new-born girls.

In the words of the Indian writer Khushwant Singh, “nine-tenths of the violence and unhappiness in this country derives from sexual repression”. Gandhi isn’t singularly to blame for India’s deeply problematic attitudes to sex and female sexuality. But he fought, and succeeded, to ensure the country would never experience sexual freedom while his legend persevered. Gandhi’s genius was to realise the great power of non-violent political revolution. But the violence of his thoughts towards women has contributed to countless honour killings and immeasurable suffering.

Remember, there’s no such thing as a saint.

Source: The Gaurdian

“Terrorism” a different meaning

The Present Century witness many “War” not on different nations but within its own Nation. US were the forefather to use the slogan to invade Iraq. No nation could question the US operation because it was fighting against terrorism. Since then many Government took the slogan and interpreted the way they liked. Now many nations are using the same slogan to solve the internal problems.
The War can be viewed as below.
The recent War is between the Government (authorized Terrorist) and the innocent civilian. The civilians are termed in different names according to their country, like in India they are called Naxalites, in Sri Lanka they are called as Tamil or LTTE. Here I would like to say how the Yemen nation is fighting against terrorism.
During the Soviet Union, America wanted to fight soviet, therefore it asked Osama to go to Afghanistan and build his business and fight against Soviet in the name of Islam. As directed he went to Afghanistan and mobilized the Muslims to fight against soviet. During this period, America asked the help of Yemen to fight against Soviet. Yemen agreed and extended its support through sending its troop. After Soviet Union collapsed, the Yemeni nation was asked to put all the soldiers who went to Afghanistan under prison saying they are Al-qaeda. Yemen did the same, however everyone in Yemen knew that these prisoners have nothing to do anything against the common public. Still the Yemeni government did it. But the Government put them for some other reason. Couple of years before some prisoners escaped. Since then the Yemeni President, Ali Abdullah Saleh asked every nation to give money because some of the prisoners escaped to America (Actually they say it was the plot done by the government to get money to solve the internal problem between north-south). But none were ready to believe. Recently the FBI in America caught a person who tried to collapse a building by a flight. When he was interrogated he said he was trained in Yemen. America said, Yemen is the latest ground for the al qaeda. Yemen president said Yes! He was trained in Yemen, and belongs to Al-qaeda, and said further that “I have been saying for years that I need money to fight against the Al-qaeda, but no country responded”. After this US organized a conference with 48 countries and agreed to give money to help Yemen to curb Al-quada. Now totally Yemen received 250 million dollars and more help through getting army equipment and other helps from various countries.
With this fund the President is going to silence the people who are fighting for separation. (Ref. EFL-University, Yemeni Friends)
In the name of War on Naxalites(one kind of terrorist, in government terms), India is killing Tribal population.
Sri Lanka puts all civilians into prison and executes saying they are LTTE (terrorist).

CASTE WISE SENSUS, AT ENGLISH AND FOREIGN LANGAUGES UNIVERSITY

The Census is carried for the Permanent staffs alone. It includes Non-teaching and Teaching staffs from our university. The given data is 99% accurate. If anyone requires to know the subcaste's population, mail me. I thought it would be controversial, therefore i have avoided for the time being. However, to say there are 2 Bangi's(They are otherwise called as mehtars, paki, relly) working in our university. one is engaged in Basheer Hostel Toilet and the other in the ladies hostel toilet. The total number of the staffs are approximately 385 till now. There is only one muslim ladies in the campus as a permanent staffs. The Reservation policy of 60 years has not increased the level of the Scavengers or Sweepers in India.
For Madigas, the highest position in the administration they hold is the Section Officer. Then the question should be: who was using the Reservation policy for 60 years?
Here i quote
AP census 2001
" The growth rate of SC population in the decade 1991-2001 at 16.5 per cent
has been higher if compared to the overall growth rate of the state population (14.6 per
cent) as a whole. Among the numerically major SCs, Mala have recorded the highest
growth rate of 29.7 per cent, followed by Madiga (25.5 per cent). On the other hand, Adi
Andhra caste, the fourth largest in the state have recorded a negative growth (-80.5 per
cent). Adi Dravida have also recorded a low growth rate of 4 per cent. Due to the ethnic
affinity, it is likely that a number of Adi Andhra and Adi Dravida have reported
themselves as Mala and/or Madiga, resulting in such a large differential in growth rate."

"Among the major SCs, Adi Andhra have been reported the highest literacy rate
of 69.6 per cent, followed by Adi Dravida (65.4 per cent) and Mala (60 per cent). More
than half of Madigas are illiterate with literacy rate of 47.5 per cent. The female literacy
rate of 43.3 per cent among SC population is lower compared to the total females of the
state (50.4 per cent) as well their male counterparts (63.5 per cent). The highest and
lowest female literacy rate of 63 per cent and 36.9 per cent have been recorded among
Adi Andhra and Madiga."

Therefore for a constructive growth there should be special attention paid not on seeing Dalit as an homogenity group rather seeing it through its own division i.e., sub-Caste. But still they are all Dalits.

ARE WE AWARE OF WHAT IS HAPPENING IN EFL-U

do any one recognize her? once she was a participant in the Russian department. She was the first girl from her Taluk to reach this premier institute. During her tenth standard she scoured the highest mark in her school. She hails from the scavenging background, her mother and father committed suicide at her early age. She is the third child for her parents, one sister and one brother. Her expenses was met by her grandmother alone by collecting equlaptus leaves in forest. with the less income she could reach till 12th standard on 1998. After these many years she comes to our university under merit. She expelled in her studies even here. Before joining this University she was working as a home-maid for 3 houses for RS. 500 each, Per month. She was happy to study in this university. But still her family situation droved her back and sent her to the same old job.
Like this there are many students who leave everything in their back home and come here with lot of hope. But what really happens is tragic. We all may think that it is a sad story to write here. We all can say that we could do nothing in her situation, but another question we should ask ourselves is at least those students who are studying in this campus should get a good future. Do they really get good education (B.A) is the question? most of the students are getting 'E', 'c' and 'D', which would be like 35% of mark. The SC/ST/OBC are the majority in getting failed. What can they do with this degree? The recent incident was also related to this. Every teacher knew that these students are scoring very less marks and they cannot have a bright future. This issue blew because of failure. But, what have they done is the question we have to ask?
Recently Teachers call a meeting in request of some faculties for discussing about a particular teachers problem. The same faculties did not call a single meeting to discuss, why did one of our students tried to attempt suicide?. If this question was raised long back then there is no need for students to raise this issue after 20 days. And we should understand that this is the 3 semester they have taken. Therefore, teachers are aware of the results awarded to students. Many of the students who were active were also silenced.
Let us hope that one day the teachers will wakeup for a students cause.

Question: Who got independence on 1947?

Recently I had been to the Central Jail to visit one of my friends. The Jail structure and the way police were guarding it arose lot many questions in me. As a result I could get a sense of how Britishers treated “natives” once, for that matter anyone who was ruling. We read lesson after lesson of our “Great” freedom struggle, and the struggle we had for getting independence. But when I saw the jail it told me one thing that yes it was true but there were some grammatical error which is forced on us to believe the independence 1947 struggle. Because, recently Telangana Mass movement is struggling to get a separate state, and the same is the case with Gorkhaland. In Maharashtra Vidharba regional struggle. And there are many more: Nandhigram struggle (Bengal), Naxalite struggle (from Andhra northwards covering the whole east corridor of India), peasant struggle, Caste struggle, and struggle against price rise. Even there are struggles where people are struggling for months together in New Delhi which are not reported. These struggle are not against non-natives, then who is it against? It means everyone of us want to get freed from various clutches, i.e. region, class, caste, BJP, Congress, CPI etc. Every day in news paper a particular Class or socially backward community is struggling for some or the other issue against other Indians.

How many police station, security guards we have in India, and these are not created for non-Indians, it is only to stop or control Indians, from what?
Because it is not we who got independence, it is they who got independence. It is left to the readers to see who “we” is and who is “they”. Therefore let us start this new century’s freedom struggle so that we can also have some more decades and enjoy and the next centuries some other can fight for another freedom struggle.
Who got independence in 1947?
These above struggles we all know very well and still why do we say “We got independence in 1947”. The simple answer is left to each one of us....

“WE HAVE A PROBLEM AND WE GIVE A SOLUTION”

The notice was put across the Campus of English and Foreign Languages University. Inquired, it was informed that the students of B.A put the notice for getting justice on the following issue.
1.To Find out whether student of German department face Caste Discrimination
2.To inquire why majority of the failure of students always belongs to a particular social group.

On the above point they called a meeting and decided to boycott the classes of B.A till the administration forms two different committee to inquire into the matter respectively, at last they succeeded in forming committees.

****

There and letter after letter distributed withing faculties and students on this particular issue. Therefore we would get the facts and post in the coming page.

LESSONS ARE LEARNT BY EXPERIENCE

In recent past Dalits committing sucide in the education institution has arose lot of debate in the way how administration discriminates students. It has become a trend to form solidarity committee after a person committs suicide. HCU was one of those recently got subjected to such an issue. In fact if the administration and the students would have taken the issues related to discrimination seriously, then we could have avoided such incidents. Both of them fail in doing so therefore Students take a drastic steps when we do not support them or try to stop the discrimination met by them at the beginning level. In Hyderabad Central University, after Senthils sucide, the Department changed its rules, which was an outcome of a committee formed to inquire into the issue.

The present issue which aggravated the normality of the atmosphere, in English and Foreign Languages University disturbed the students community a lot in particular the SC/ST/OBC and minority students. Actually the discrimination got blew from the German department where certain students were not allowed to sit in the class. When we analyzed the issue it was found, there were many such students belonging to socially Backward community who lacked in to be promoted to the next semester.

Though the university provides the Remideal Course for the backward students. Still we require a through investigation on why majority of failures are from reserved background. Because, we cannot work like an administrative body which find a temporary solution and washes its hands away. Hence the administration should be pressed to form a Committee with autonomous power, comprising students, faculties and experts from outside to enquire and bring suggestion to the administration. This would be a possible way of reaching to the students.

And since we are a growing University, we could set a role model to other Universities with the help of Vice-Chancellor, Whom for sure will support such an initiative.

In relation to the above reasons we again request students, non-teaching staffs belonging to reserved category and well wishers to demand the administration to form a committee that will enquire the academics of students and implement their suggestion.



check the link for more details on Caste, Suicide
http://insightyv.com/?p=300

Discrimination met by Dalit students

How Caste functions in an academical atmosphere, at the level of teaching.
Across India the question of Caste and its funtion is debated and discussed in various fields, at present let us focus on academics and political arena. Therefore let us understand Caste in the present issue (in the context of English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad). The Indian government had introduced the reservation policy for those who are socially and economically backwardness, the backwardness was debated and discussed. The backwardness is still debated in the educational and other various arenas. It is every important to see on what level those issues are debated, either in bookish or in practical. Before let us see where do the backward students come from?

The majority of the Indian population dwells in the rural population, without schools and sometimes without even electricity. They live under poverty. It becomes an imagination for the partents to admit their sons in english medium. Some times even the sons/daughters go to work to support their family. There are students who go to school for the mid day meal. These are very little problems they face in their every day life. Still students explore in their studies.

To imporve the backwardness the Indian government introduced Government schools in across every state. Every person knows the conditions of those schools. In fact those are schools for name sake in rural areas, where there are no faculties even and in certain places there are no proper buildings to hold classes, when it rains or during the hot sun. Even the facuties will be irrruegular, I still remember a faculty who will be drunk in class (Government Hight School, Kotagiri),

Those people who get educated and come to a higher position also fails in addressing these primary and long term issues. There are still good number of population do not even go to the schools. It lies due to the lack of visibility from the governmental pro gramme to educate or to reform the academic atmosphere. Most students from rural areas are the first generation. Yes, it is surprising that they are first generation even after 60 years of Independence. The surprise does not stop here, because there are crores of people who are not availing this education also still. (Let us ask ourselves. How many Bhangis, mehtars, pakis, sakkiliyars, or any student from Scavenging background? When you count you may get a shocking result.)
It is as important to discuss or see even how their atmosphere is in back home, which is an alienated from their studies. However, still people explore in the results and at recent times there are people who come under open category. It may arise a question immediately, why there are people who do not explore as the others who do. The answer should be directed towards ourselves, why in general category there are people who fail?. Therefore the success of some students cannot be compared or be a deciding factor of the system or the teachers involved in teaching. Even faculty knew that there are different students coming from different background, socially, regionally, economically, to study. The teachers should know that the students coming from such a deprived background is not an optional of their choice. If the teacher is aware of such a background or the history of their backwardness, then the teacher will pay special attention and encourage such students in class. The encouraging happens but at what level, just at the level of comedy (monetary help and providing books) or with sincerity in educating them. Even the success of any teacher lies not at the level of students who are already ‘forward’ in their education but rather those who educate students from the scratch. How many students did this university produce? However, there is a limit even in the involvement of faculty is concerned, which I am aware of. And I am speaking in the level of their involvement not on their limitation above the sky. There are rules framed or governed by the administration to make sure the students involvement in the academics too. I am speaking of those students whose academical involvement was fulfilled, such as their attendance and giving their internal exams.
Every teachers who teach would have knew that certain students are not going to qualify. Before going further I even like to say there can be occasions where students are forced not to qualify in their exams. In the first case the teachers should have involved to teach her and made sure she is prepared to face the exam.
Let us take the statistics of the present exams result. There are many students who are failed. Cant we see some similarity among all those who failed the exam. If we think that they do not study well then I suppose we have to go and read the injustice done to those people historically and get back to read the rest of the article. The similarity is Caste in large.
The Face of Discrimination on Caste lines
According to the Supreme Court order, said students who failed in three subjects should be given a chance and promoted to the next semester. Though the order was these in favour of the students one department was reluctant to follow, and showed the University rules where the students cannot be permitted. The teacher even said if I have the power to allow them in class I would be the first person to do so. Therefore it was said that the faculty will allow if only VC, the supreme authority to decide, involves by permitting them to allow in class. Then came the shock when VC wrote to the faculty to allow, the faculty replied she might resign rather allowing the student in the class. This is where the social context interfere to make us understand the reason for the faculty not involving the students to the class. The faculty is from the Upper Caste and this is the third time the same teacher shows such a discrimination to students who are socially backward. Is this the behavior of the teacher to show such a discrimination towards students who are socially backward? However, I would like to say at this instance that it is not all faculties are treating socially backward students like this. There are many faculties who treat all students equally and educate them. As a result here I am writing because of a faculty who taught and encouraged me.

appeal to end caste discrimination in EFL University, Hyderabad

One fine day, the second day of the semester, Prof. Meenakshi Reddy, the dean of the German studies enters into the third semester class and asks two of the students (OBC) to leave the class on the basis that they have failed in two subjects in the examination of the previous semester. And then she asks two other students(SC/ST) to leave the class by saying that “you might have understood, what I said.” One of the two students asked her to expalin why students who did not take the exams are allowed to sit(today when we were discussing she said that VC asked her orally to accept them to sit in the 4th semester class), and we are asked to get out of the class? She replied that is a different case and yours is a different case. Therefore these 4 students went to VC's office, where he asked them to wait till monday. (5days). On Monday the students went to VC. He said Meenakshi Reddy has taken a decision and therefore you go to her she will tell you what to do. When the students approached Meenakshi Reddy, she said whomever failed should sit in the second semester and will not be allowed to sit in the fourth semester. The students requested/begged her to allow them to sit. She told them that they are not able to cope with the course therefore under her custodianship she can allow them to stay in the hostel and audit the second semester course without any scholarship. The students cried and begged to not do this because they are coming from a humbe backgroud and cannot afford to repeat a year. Her reply was that she can't help it because she is not the authority to decide. The students again went to the VC, and he asked the students to go to Meenakshi Reddy and that he will himself speak to her. The same day they went again to Prof.Meenakshi Reddy. She said she cannot do anything and repeated that she can allow them to sit in the 2nd semester. It was late by then, and the next day they went to VC again and he said he has written a letter to German department asking them to allow the students. When the students went there she said “If Chindambaram (Home Minister) or your Chief Minister of your state asks me to allow also, I cant allow”, and said further that in case such situation arises she might resign rather admitting these students to the class( this was told in the class too). (Later we came to know that she has given a resignation to the VC that if she is asked she would resign) The students asked the department that whether they received the letter and they replied in the negative. We went to Controller of Examination to confirm whether VC's decision has reached them. He said he has already forwarded it to the Department. The studentse went to VC again and he said he cannot do anything, and that he has done whatever he could. This was happening for one week. There was a week end and on monday one of the students attempted suicide in the near by Seetafal mandi railway station. Fortunately she was saved, this was reported in all news channels. Then we went to VC shockingly he called her on mobile and asked to allow them. Then they were allowed.

After this incident the two SC/ST students were been approached by various other faculty and students asking them why did they do this. They all was of the opinion that Meenakshi Reddy is a nice woman in the class.

Meenakshi Reddy had a prior history of caste based discrimination. In 2008 she, in her position as the Head of the Department, had converted the SC/ST reserved seats in the German Certificate of Proficiency Course to General Category. Further she has a history of being rude to SC/ST students approaching her for various reasons.

Later, we some Dalit students went to VC asking an explanation and to seek her resignation for showing discrimination against the students. He begged every one asking not to do any thing as such. He even said that he went to each students who were active in the university room asking them to be flexible in this issue. However, some students felt such discrimination should not be overlooked. Today (29-01-10) we went to ask to assure that such kind of discrimination will not happen in the future. She messaged a group of students and called some faculties. Thereupon some faculty members came into her room and started speaking on her behalf. We demanded that we need to hear the reassurance from Meenakshi Reddy's mouth. However, she consistently refused even though Prof.Rajagopal himself told her the same. From 11am to 1pm, Meenakshi Reddy was adamant that she would word any such reassurance. Then, some 30 students from the BA German barged in and pointing fingers at the students in the chamber, said “we don't know who you are. You have no business to be here. Come out and talk to us and we will show you”. Following this, they pulled the collar of one of the Dalit research scholars present there. We said that we are here to talk to Meenakshi Reddy.

The issue then ended in a scuffle and the administration can now rejoice that they have succesfully silenced the Dalit and other depressed class students by turning a chunk of students against them. Though the Dalit students then sat demanding justice in front of VC's chamber for the next four hours, the VC was adamant that he would not speak to them. Moreover, on his way to the chamber, he also termed it a “non-issue”.

We request all of you readers to react to this issue. Please mobilize whatever resources you can command to react to this discrimination.

Also, the following is a letter we had drafted to present before the administration, which was however thwarted in the course of the day.

The flow of the incident.
Those students failed in two subject have got a very less GPA. However, In recent case the supreme court said students from reserved backgroud should be given a chance. This was given in the earlier semesters, where students failed in 3 subject were allowed to take the next semester.

It is not that only in german department students failed. Students were failed in most other department too but they were allowed on the same day of re-opening.

There were students who did not take the exams but they were allowed to sit in the same German department.

What it really meant when she said that “If Chindambaram (Home Minister) or your Chief Minister of your state asks me to allow also, I cant allow”.






LETTER


The recent incident of a particular female student of II yr Foreign Languages attempting suicide has brought into focus several issues which were hitherto hidden but have now surfaced. Let us recount them:

1)The idea of merit based on a uniform scale:
The reasons which led to the above mentioned incident are as follows: The student had failed in her third semester examination. Following which, the German Department was insistent on not permitting her to continue into the next semester, though similar incidents in every other foreign language department were condoned. In the discussions which followed, the idea of “German efficiency” is constantly being referred to. This is a very convenient argument that at the same time conceals the undemocratic nature of the educational system of the country as a whole, and on the other hand projects this “efficiency” as an ideal to look up to.

The reality is very different though. Firstly, one must agree that the student is a student by virtue of his/her having cleared a set of requirements which include an entrance examination. Therefore, the merit of the said student is also unquestionable. The question then is, “how is that a student who has cleared the entrance examination and (in this particular case, though not necessarily in every case) has cleared her first year examinations, fails to live up to the standards of the university?” The commonsensical answer is that these students belong (as empirically proven in our university) to the Reserved Categories. This answer is often whispered, and never spoken aloud in any open forum. This in itself constitutes a violence, because it denies the option of a discussion and thereby violates the right of the accused (of meritlessness) to defend him/herself.

Once we agree that most of the failed students are from the Reserved Category, it is easy for accusers to say that these students have entered the university only by the merit of fixed seat numbers reserved for them, irrespective of what marks they get. This in itself constitutes an already assumed inferior position of the students. One should then remember that this reservation system contributes to making our nation a truly democratic setup. The reservation system is based on historical truths, that of deprivation and of denied access to public resources which a certain section of the country's population has been historically subjected to. Therefore, the very idea of reservation is based on providing a level ground of competition.

By implementing reservation, the university agrees to the above in theory. But what should we understand from the fact that a student granted admission on these grounds has failed in subsequent exams? It means that in practice, in everyday academic life, the university does not follow the spirit of the Constitution. The very fact that Reserved Category students constitute the chunk of “failures” underscores the fact that, in practice, the reservation policy is violated. To put reservation into practice one should then have a real-egalitarian measure in the case of examination also. This would involve evolving criteria for measurement which takes into account factors like the initial profile of the student matched against the subsequent performances in percentage, a radical refashioning of the syllabus as per the real-life needs and cultural life-worlds of the students, eradication of merit based on examination marks and a juxtaposition of mark vs. background in its stead, abolishing of “failed” category, etc. Once the category of “failed” is abolished, students will be able to continue through the course at a single stretch, while they should also be given the provision of grade improvement exams atleast once in each semester.

By evoking a law uniform to all sections of the society, heedless of their historical backgrounds, by sticking to the letter of law and not its spirit, by treating such failed students in a manner which will humiliate them, which will bring upon self-harming responses from them, the university has failed to live up to the historical compensation which the state promises its depressed citizens.

It should be noted here that those who are invoking law against these students are forgetting their duty, again enjoined by law and reiterated by the Supreme Court in relation to the failed students case in Delhi IIT, that the centre of learning has a constitutional responsibility to ensure that the Reserved Category students are at par with the General Category students. This in effect means that providing equal opportunity is not a gesture of equality but a perpetuation of existing inequalities. What we want is a radical transformation of the idea of merit itself.

On the other hand, a teacher training in this country should correspond to the post-Mandal realities where education has ceased to be the privileged possession of a few. They should take into consideration that a newer demography of students has entered this campus and instead of looking down on them, the university should realize the potential that these students from diverse backgrounds have to offer, if catered to sensitively. These students, hailing from life-worlds hitherto kept off bounds of university, has to offer the society novel ways of p[erception which can revolutionize our very procedures of knowledge formations. It will be a historical blunder and failure on the part of the university if it fails to acknowledge and make use of this variegated experiences of these students and subject them to the obsolete, wornout and fetishized academic practices.

2)The university as family and whimsical justice:
The university administration constantly evokes the idea of students as siblings and the faculty as their parents. This idea in itself is a mask which hides the diverse backgrounds that the students come from, and installs in its place the idea of an imagined equality where each person, regardless of his background, can achieve things equally. This imagination then conceals the real-life hurdles of a large section of students. This is another way of saying that because the university provides the same facility to everyone, they should have the same potential. This leaves out the fact that there are real differences among the students -rural/urban, english medium/regional medium, had TV at home/couldn't afford, had time to have a hobby/had to be a helping hand in the family... In other words, it is saying that we enter the university without memories, like a clean slate -which we did not.

The flip side to this same argument is that the teachers are equal to our parents who can render justice. It is no wonder then that in many cases the university resorts to a method of justice by whims.

Let us take this specific case. All the other departments in the Foreign Languages except the German department allowed the failed students to continue. How is it possible that the university works on such informal arrangement where one unsympathetic faculty member has such enormous control over the fate of the students? The answer is, the university has to formulate a clear cut rule regarding failed students, which nevertheless takes into account the diverse background of the students.

Is there a contradiction between this and point no.1? No. What we demand is a set of democratic ules rather than an option of”sympathetic” interpretation of rules, or a case of sympathetic non-implementation of rules. One should consider such conditions of life that prevail in many of the students from depressed classes which do not allow them the luxury of losing a year and coming back in the next. Instead, we should have a system of automatic entry into the next semester wherein the students can reappear for those subjects in which they have failed even while they continue pursuing their course.

3)Majoritarianism:
While a teacher's aim is to improve and educate the maximum number of students, there is nothing desirable in it if this comes at the price of a depressed minority. The depressed minority here is the Reserved Category. It has come to our notice that some teachers conduct their classes in certain regional languages (no matter how predominant that language is in the national imagination). his is a violation of the very criteria of entry into the university which conducts its entrance examination in English. While we agree that this measure might be useful for the majority of students, it comes with the price of alienating and being unreachable for a section of students who have historically no access, or due to historical political factors, even an unconscious aloofness, to this particular regional language.

4)The importance of “feelings”
The current procedure of teacher assessment in our university is based on a set of objective scores which do not leave scope for the feelings of the students. The teacher assesment need to be revamped to take into consideration those aspects regarding a teacher, his/her teaching and the holistic academic experience that cannot just be expressed in numbers. And equally important is that the assessment should have real implication for the teacher rather than an informal reprimand (at its best). There should be an option to fail the teacher, just as a student can be failed.

In the light of these facts, we demand the following:

1)The University should reach out to the depressed sections of students and reassure them a real-egalitarian treatment in terms of education and way of life within the campus. We believe that an apology tendered to the concerned students is the least and the essential beginning to this process.
2)Remedial training for teachers to enable them to sensitively deal with students of diverse backgrounds. A revamped teacher assessment structure that can take into account the student emotions rather than just “objective judgement”, and an option to fail the teacher.
3) The medium of education should be limited to the specific foreign language being taught , and/or English.
4)The abolishing of failed category, a point-based system which takes into account background; and a stage by stage profiling of student performance in all exams, extracurricular activities which include sports, volunteer activities for various university activities including involvement in political activities; a flagging of the topic based on the relevance to historical situations and division of marks in a subject for the various topics based on this flagging, a minimum of 50% of marks to be allotted to topics which can be related to by the students according to the varied lifeworlds.

PERISHING DEMOCRACY, FLOWERING HYPOCRISY

The word meant an alternation for other modes of Government. And in practical democracy is better than any other modes of Government. Still did Democracy do justice for the whole population. When does the wordy democracy comes into our thought? it usually comes during the local and central election time. How is this difference with other forms of Government? let us take the Dictatorship government, where one person rules the other. According to the understanding of the meaning of Democracy, it means that people rule the country, which is a false understanding. Even if we have to go with the last statement, the literal meaning of democracy is not there, rather the 'Dictatorship' is changed into 'democracy' term were people accept one mans rule and do not have any option. what is happening in Indian government, with the Telengana issue, the majority of the Telenaga population wants a seprate state, same with north east wants to be seprated, Tamil in sri lanka wants to be seprated. To the above demand how does the government react to such issues. one way of reacting is through state sponsored violence, through Rapid Action Force, Parlimentary Force, Central Reserve Force, etc. We have to see these action forces are created by the democratical government to enforce on the general public. In otherway to see, whenever there is a mass movement rising the first this the government will ask the intellingence to check who are those people and putting them in custody with full toarcher. Utleast in India do we have democararcy if we have are we allowed to speak against the government or the state. Even it surprises that the democractic government do not alow the press to function.
Therefore at present the word democracy has leading towards the Dictatorship ruling.

Something always surprises me

The name Hitler reflects various things in our imagination, one of those images is that a gruesome dictator ruthlessly killed jews. as a result we decide upon saying that Hitler is an example of how a leader should not be, and how a ruler should not treated his own people?. These all led from his gruesome approach during his rule. yes, its all true.
But i wonder during his whole regime there where people who complained to the Pope(who was closely associated with Germany) about his activities, were the Pope turned to be a mere spectators. And during the world war second there were countries allies with Germany, which means that they too accepted him, it is the fact that all the developing nation during that period of time knew his way of approach. Apart from this, His gruesome behavior came to light after his defeat in the world war. Before this there were no alarm raised by any country or people against his behaviors. Hitler was not an superman to lead all his crimes under every ones eyes. Therefore he was not a individual to be blamed as "Hitler", rather the whole world especially the near observers where to be blamed, May be the Americans and the Pope of Rome. First before reading this further, let us ask a question why there were no anymore "Hitlers" after Germany's defeat. Hence, what is the qualification to make or compare with the German dictator. Is that the numbers were out numbered in his genocide killing.

What so ever I see many Hitlers across the world alive. Let us see some of the recent incidents below for consideration.


What Happened in the final face of the Sri Lankan war, thousands of civilians were butchered, murdered and raped. Even some Human rights organization says it is a recent Genocide. Was this activities carried alone by Sri Lanka an individual state. The answer is no. Can we call every one involved even by supporting the activities as Hitlers. Then can we call the rulers of the following states as Hitler, India, China, Pakistan, Cuba, Russia, Israel and other countries.
Doesn't the above nations be called as a ruthless government towards civilian population and it is the new approach adopted in the present century to be Hitler is a sophisticated manner(by calling they are democratically elected government)

The Indian Government in the name of eradicating Naxalites they are massacring, and raping innocent Tribal population in States. Further the Indian government in the name of security measures doing the same for decades together in Kashimir and north east. And every politicians and Indian citizines are aware of this.
doesn't the above act of the Indian government qualify to be one of those Hitler regime of the 21st century. In my opinion it is.

What Happened in GAZA, what is happening to the whole Muslim nations and population accross the world.

Given the above atmosphere there are many Hitlers across the world. AND sometimes we ourselves turn to be Hitler.
These facts surprises me but not anylonger.

India is a "Democratic" Country, 26th is to make fool of people

The face of our democracy.
If we all boast that we have achieved in 60 years of under Indian government. Then may be we all belong or in the deep sea of lies spread or created by the ruling Congress, and the opposition Parties of India.

In my view the following were our success....

Let us take a look of the Railway Minister's decision which makes very difficult to book a Tatkal Ticket only in last two days, people start queueing the Railway station before 5.00 a.m in the morning. How can a person from a village reach the destination, where the bus travel starts at 7.00 am and has to travel 20 kilometres? Therefore the lower, and middle class people(who do not have access to transport or internet) who are the majority of the Indian population and suffer the most of such decisions. This awful decision was our success of the Government and we being the mere spectators were our success.

The central i.e the congress government had introduced contractual system. especially Group D employees position to be given to contractual labours. As our Indian government is corrupt how can the government think of handing it over to the Contractors. We all knew that the "Contractors" are better than the Indian state, in harassing men and women. And our so called Communist partes and other labour unions or the Trade Unions of India did not raise a voice over this. Maybe , if the leaders' family or the relatives were working in this field they would have known the "Sweetness" of their job security.

These people basically belong to the SC/ST/OBC and minority of the middle and lower class people. Surprisingly the social movements also neglected the issue.

The government succeeded by making Karnataka High Court Mr. Dinakaran's Issue his personal issue rather than Caste issue. Since our Dalit Activists are busy in Various other issues which includes lobbying for their own personal benefits, they didn't find time to make a Caste issue. And Of Course it is a Caste issue. Why are the Karnataka lawyers so much interested in removing him? If we cant understand or the relavance of this then sure those who call themselves social activists or academicians should hang themselves.

Last, but not the least, our government and we ourselves have reserved the job of manual scavenging and sweeping across India reserved for a particular community
to be continued....

120 Faculty Recruitment at Central University, Hyd

‘Major Hindrance to Democratic Movement among Sri Lankan Tamils has been Removed’

In the following interview Varadaraja Perumal, the former Chief Minister of the north and east in Sri Lanka, speaks to Mainstream editor on the changed scenario in the island state following the killing of Velupillai Prabhakaran, the LTTE supremo, on May 18, 2009. Perumal was the CM of the north and east in 1988-90; he is one of the leaders of the Eelam People’s Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF) that had to bear the brunt of Prabhakaran’s ire, and at present resides in India.
Are you convinced that Prabhakaran is no more?
VP: Definitely, there is no doubt about that. The photographs are there for all to see. Then, Karuna was taken to the spot and he identified the body.
Was Karuna the closest to Prabhakaran at one time?
VP: He was the second-in-command in the LTTE till 2004.
I also want to tell you that there is no reason for the Sri Lankan Government to lie about Prabhakaran’s death.
If this is true then would you say that the LTTE has become an orphan today?
VP: This is the end of the LTTE though there are still 500-600 LTTE cadres who are moving around in the eastern province and the deep jungles of Vanni in the north.
Do they have weapons?
VP: They have some weapons.
Do they have any leadership?
VP: They don’t have any leadership. So these LTTE cadres’ operation as armed groups could be for a short period—after all, how would they replenish their weapons?
In this scenario who will give leadership to the Sri Lankan Tamils?
VP: We should not harbour the misconception that the LTTE had been so far giving leadership to the Tamil people of Sri Lanka. In fact the LTTE is a terrorist group which destroyed the Sri Lankan Tamil leadership starting from the killing of Srisabaratnam (TELO) in 1986 followed by the liquidation of Amrithalingam (TULF), Padmanabha (EPRLF), Neelan Thiruchelvam (TULF), Keethes-waran (EPRLF).
More than 10,000 leaders and fighters of the Sri Lankan Tamils, belonging to different organisations other than the Tamil Tigers, were killed by the LTTE since 1986.
The LTTE under Prabhakaran suppressed any intellectual opinion. In fact that LTTE spread terror among the Tamil people—that is, it injected terror in the minds of the Tamil people—wherever they lived.
But how do you explain the groundswell of support for Prabhakaran and the Tamil Tigers among the expatriate Tamils in particulars?
VP: Well, if you consider the Tamil society as such, its members did not view the issues logically or rationally, with deep passion and anti-Sinhala sentiments they supported the LTTE.
As far as the Tamil diaspora is concerned, they are a lost population to the society of Sri Lankan Tamils. Among them vested interest is intertwined with their support to the LTTE. To stay on in their country of residence they need to have refugee status which is ensured if the war in Sri Lanka continues interminably thus making their return to the island state next to impossible.
What will happen now in Sri Lanka?
VP: The killing of the LTTE leadership as a whole, including Velupillai Prabhakaran, has removed the major hindrance to the development of the democratic movement among Tamils—the democratic leaders are now in a position to go and work among their own people without any impediment.
But what is the objective of the Sri Lankan Government? Haven’t there been grave human rights violations in the latest fight-to-the-finish against the LTTE?
VP: The objective of the Sri Lankan Government and human rights violations are no doubt important, but the primary issue is the Tamil question. Till now the Tamil cause was hijacked by the LTTE under a separatist banner.
The majority of the Tamil people know that separation or secession, that is, Eelam, is impossible. But all of them thought that by fighting by the side of the LTTE they would be able to wrest their demands from the Sinhala leaders. However, while fighting for the Tamils the LTTE could not deliver any benefits to the Tamils. Rather, by killing the Tamil leaders, the LTTE prevented any rise of Tamil leaders or organisations not affiliated to the LTTE.
Are you saying Eelam is impossible?
VP: The struggle for separation or secession died many years ago—when the LTTE attacked the TELO and killed the TELO leaders in 1986 the movement for secession had died a premature death.
But won’t the demand for Eelam come up once again in the future?
VP: The point is that the struggle of the Tamil people will continue if the Sri Lankan leaders do not create an environment in which the Tamil people are able to enjoy an autonomous political system.
Would the Tamil struggle be violent or non-violent in the coming days?
VP: In future the struggle will be mostly non-violent. Already the Tamil people have experienced violent struggle in the north and east of the island state. Non-violent struggle alone will create conditions for the Sinhala people to understand and accept the Tamils’ reasonable demands.
You were Chief Minister of the north and east in 1988-90. What was your experience on the question of devolution of power to the Tamil areas?
VP: At that time Premadasa was the President of Sri Lanka. Earlier during the tenure of President Jayawardene, the 13th Amendment was passed and this affectively prevented the devolution process. The 13th Amendment has many lacunae—there is insufficiency of powers in it; moreover it is a bad law and liable to be misinterpreted. At the same time it goes against the spirit of both devolution and the Indo-Sri Lanka accord of 1987. There was no willingness on the part of the Sinhalor leaders to go for devolution then and they used the 13th Amendment to prevent devolution. At that period I was not Chief Minister of the north and east with the powers that the Chief Ministers enojoy in the different States of India—rather, I was a Chief Minister striving for devolution of power.
However, if a President is sincere he can interpret the 13th Amendment such as to carry out devolution. In President Chandrika Kumaratunga’s time a new devolution package was sought to be presented. Opposition leader Ranil Wickrema-singhe accepted a federal structure.
President Mahinda Rajapaksa can also use the 13th Amendment to bring about devolution of power. In fact, under the chairmanship of Minister for Science and Technology Tissa Vitharana an all-party committee has been set up by the President to look into the devolution package.
Do you think there is a possibility of carrying out devolution by President Rajapaksa?
VP: Of course, nothing has been closed.
How do you want the Government of India to play a positive role in this regard?
VP: The relations between the governments of India and Sri Lanka are now quite good. Both the governments should speak to the Tamil, Sinhala and Muslim leaders and bring about some settlement. The leaders of Tamil Nadu must also be involved to substantially contribute to the process.
Do you think that in this new situation following Prabhakaran’s death new avenues to resolve the Tamil problem have opened up?
VP: Yes. Till now the Sinhala leaders had been saying that so long as the LTTE is continuing its violent activities in the north and east it is impossible for us to speak about devolution. Now that pretext has gone.
I personally feel some kind of trust between the Sinhala leaders of Sri Lanka and leaders of Tamil Nadu should be built as soon as possible. That will definitely benefit the Tamil people of Sri Lanka.
How did President Mahinda Rajapaksa carry out this stupendous task of liquidating the LTTE whereas all his predecessors had failed in such an effort? What is your take on that?
VP: President Rajapaksa was driven by singleminded purpose of eliminating the source of LTTE’s terror. As for his immediate predecessor, President Kumaratunga was beset with numerous problems even though she too sincerely wanted peace and solution of the Tamil question.
One more point: the Government of India did not in any way disturb the Sri Lankan military operations against the LTTE.
But the Government of India is worried about the humanitarian problems before the Sri Lankan Tamils today.
VP: The Government of India is doing everything possible to extend humanitarian help to the Sri Lankan Tamils. However, this is a task which must be taken up not just by India but the entire international community. The international community must be generous in providing relief to and rehabilitating the displaced Sri Lankan Tamils.
Do you anticipate some terrorist activities in Sri Lanka after Prabhakaran’s death?
VP: Not for long. If the Sri Lankan state is serious such activities cannot continue for long.
You have known Prabhakaran for a long time. How would you describe him?
VP: He was one of the most ruthless terrorist leaders in the world. But at the same time he was politically a coward.
Kindly explain how.
VP: He was not able to face any political challenge or any critical opinion.
Today happens to be former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s 18th death anniversary. We all know he met his death on May 21, 1991 under orders of Prabhakaran. Now that Prabhakaran has been killed would you say that Rajiv Gandhi’s family has been able to secure justice?
VP: Yes, of course. God has secured justice to the families and friends of Rajiv Gandhi, Padmanabha, Keetheswaran and others who were brutally massacred by Prabhakaran.
I recollect all my memories of Rajiv Gandhi today because he was a person who committed himself personally to deliver political benefits to the Tamil people of Sri Lanka while maintaining his commitment to ensure Sri Lanka’s integrity. I wish Rajiv Gandhi was alive to witness this event of the elimination of the murderer Prabhakaran who brought so much misery to the peoples of Sri Lanka and India.
What lies in the future of the Sri Lankan Tamils?
VP: The Sri Lankan Tamil people would now have to find out those leaders who are capable of fighting for devolution and effectively conducting the devolution movement.