By Abhismita Sen
The surfacing of the youth as a distinct political class is especially striking in newly founded nations. Similarly in India, the idea of student politics has had a long history. In fact, students of the country have played an enormous role in the freedom struggle of the nation.
In sovereign post independent India, the birth of numerous student organizations with diverse political ideologies and affiliations played a crucial role in not only shaping the opinion of the youth towards policies but also in attracting the focus of the government towards specific academic issues such as admission policies, tuition, academic freedom and student interests as a whole.
Today, we live in a time when the forces of globalization, led by international finance capital, influence the livelihoods of every stratum in the country. As an open market economy took a higher role in the sphere of administration, the monopoly of the political parties has been considerably challenged, even when it came to their sponsoring of branched wings such as student organizations. Hence, the sense of consciousness of political emancipation among students has been often found to have somewhat diminished in many parts of the country, in the liberalized era. The growth of privately owned colleges has further boosted the lack of consciousness for rights and the need to form associations in the campus among urban youth.
At the same time, with the shifting temperament of the worldwide workplace in the globalized India, students are looking for educational environments in which they will have opportunities to work elbow to elbow with persons from very different backgrounds, including those from other countries and cultures and for a system which would promptly respond to their demands. Students are fearlessly demanding a higher degree of autonomy and the responsibility to conduct their activities on their own.
Recently, the youth of West Bengal was on loggerheads over a decision passed by the erstwhile Government. The decision was the bar on elections in the campuses of the State and even a possibility of terminating the involvement of the student community in politics altogether.
The context of such a decision had been a series of violent clashes that had taken place across various college campuses in the state, most notably the incident at a South Calcutta college, where the tussle between goons hired by a pair of political adversary groups resulted in the death of a cop and injured several students and residents of the area, disrupting transport and communication throughout the day. Soon, a 22-year-old student activist was seriously injured in a protest camp and eventually failed to survive.
Several propositions aiming to explain the loss flooded the Internet and the media, but ultimately every theory ended with the safest explanation that anti-social elements have successfully crept in politics in campuses. Naturally, there was a general consensus on part of the government and the civil society to avoid the whole process of elections and voting in the colleges whether funded by the government itself or not under the pretext of rural polls and a number of board examinations.
Indeed politics in educational institutions throughout the country has had a long legacy of clashes and often violence. The politicization of educational institutions often manifest in the habit of making academic appointments on the basis of party colour or of shaping the curricula along party lines. As a result, outdated curricula, erratic faculty members and degrees that barely lead to jobs gnaw many campuses in the country.
Starting from the Naxalite movement of the 1970s, now romanticized as the golden age of student politics in the country, violence has been a popular idiom of protest. Even today very often students are subjected to violence and coercion in institutes where campus politics is prevalent, with the eminence of education afflicting on account of the recurrent commotions by such bodies, which often resort to horde tactics to get their demands heard. Recognizing this, some of the best educational institutions of the country like the IITs and IIMs have gone ahead and banned politicization of student unions, with some States like Kerala completely forbidding student union elections.
However, the Constitution of India gives every person the right to form associations; hence the demand to ban student union election is unconstitutional. Beside, the J.M. Lyngdoh committee constituted by the Supreme Court to sketch the course of action for carrying out student union elections is unequivocal when it comes to the question of whether election should be held or not. It states, Universities and colleges across the country must ordinarily conduct elections for the appointment of students to student representative bodies. These elections may be conducted in the manner prescribed herein, or in a manner that conforms to the standards prescribed herein. (Lyngdoh Commission Report, Page: 40).
Students being entitled to their political views should exercise their right to vote and be encouraged to take positions on political issues of the country, which will make them responsible and conscious citizens of the future. Denying them the consciousness to form associations and develop their view is thus grossly undemocratic, in the era when every individual in relations to the liberalized view wants autonomy and a space for free thinking.
Student Unions form the only forum in the campuses through which the pupils get to voice their views and opinions regarding the administration of their colleges and the crucial decisions which would go on to influence the course of their lives in the coming years. Without these bodies, universities or colleges will become authoritarian where only the whims and fancies of the administration or teachers will be the last word. Students Unions thus help in perpetuating the tradition of democracy in every campus.
Here comes the question of formation and partisanship of the unions. Many a times this question has been raised whether unions can or cannot be free from politics. In reality, without the involvement of parent political organizations, the initiative to form Student groups would go aimless, as there would be no fixed sources or ceilings in arranging funds, nobody to choose the group strategy or attract membership. Therefore, the respective political ambitions to mobilize large groups to broaden the social base of the bigger political parties, which is often considered an evil for imposing a fixed ideology on gullible minds is actually the guiding force behind making Indian students politically conscious. Without partisanship the so called apolitical groups would suffer an invariable leadership crisis with scanty funds and often a model of unfair favoritism in distribution of portfolios, while established parties would refrain from any of these for the fear of losing popular support.
While patronage among student unions is a necessary evil in India, certain strong negative aspects of the same repel a large section of the society towards student politics. Dominating every facet of the operation of the partisan student organizations and making them a shareholder to the trials and tribulations of the parent political party has been disadvantageous to the student politics in the country since the inception of student wings of every party. Instead of focusing on student issues, student organizations are seen acting as surrogate political parties, defending every action of their parent parties and mindlessly indulging in hooliganism against the political adversaries.
In order to curb this coercive mounding of ideologies and interference on every aspect in a campus, the Lyngdoh Commission has made several important recommendations. First, the Commission advocated an indirect system of elections which should be completed within 2 to 3 hours of a single day and where the Dean of the institution should be the returning officer. Posters and all the other propaganda-oriented materials should be removed immediately after the election process would be over. Secondly, it suggested that the election campaigning should be strictly confined only to the university/college premises and election-related expenditure should have a ceiling. The audited report of election-related expenditure should be submitted to the administrative blocks. Failure to submit the audited report should result in cancellation of the election. Thirdly, the commission insisted that no politicians and ex-students should be allowed to enter the university/college premises or address the students in connection with the students election. Lastly, there would be certain academic, character and age related eligibility criterion for the contestants of the elections.
Keeping the tradition of equality of the Indian constitution alive, the commission recommended reservations for female Students, Students from weaker socio-economic groups and bright students from the field of academics, co-curricular activities etc.
In addition, the Committee was empowered to examine and consider all aspects relating to the conduct of students elections, such as aspects affecting the academic atmosphere in educational institutions including, but not limited to, indiscipline and divisions on the basis of political beliefs and such other avoidable considerations. The Committee was also empowered to focus on the need to ensure that elements undesirable to the academic atmosphere in universities do not enter students unions.
But like most Indian legislations, the Lyngdoh Commission recommendations too failed to undergo complete implementation, due to administrative glitches. There was no strict emphasis on penalties in case of failure in adherence to the norms and no stern stress on execution of the clauses. In most campuses the supporters of the dominant groups who suffered from political bias occupied the upper administrative positions. Like most government sectors, the universities also were inefficient in maintenance of records and bookkeeping of elections. Violence was often encouraged instead of being reprimanded. Several eminent campuses like the Jawaharlal Nehru University openly rejected the recommendations.
What fails to be understood by the general public and often the media is the violence and unrest in campuses concerning elections is a mere reflection of the greater share these antisocial elements occupy when it comes to the larger spectrum of politics in India at large. Therefore, in order to purge the campuses, stern actions need to be taken to alleviate these maladies from Indian politics in general rather than resorting to complete abstention of campus democracy.
There have been adequate litigations to protect the students and education at large from the clutches of inhumanity in the name of campus politics, but in action these targets have never been achieved. It is time the election commission forms a chapter for the peaceful conduction of campus elections too which would be away from political affiliations and which would personally look into the election matters starting from campaigning, to enlistment of nominations till the results. It is for the legislative bodies to enforce this condition mandatorily through constitutional amendments and subsequent enforcement. The University Grants Commission should form a round the clock helpline service for harassment and assaults which would serve prompt action. Such an action on part of the Commission instead of respective state education ministries is likely to reduce political bias to a greater extent. Armed Central Police forces rather than mere low ranked officers of the state police should be kept stand by at every campus during elections. In this regard, having elections on the same day at every campus in the country or bifurcating campuses on basis of zones and declaring the result of all the colleges/ universities of each zone on the same day can be a good idea. The issue of mandatory identity proofs for students issued by the election commission not the educational body to avoid eternal elements is a good although a costly suggestion. However, when looked into the aggregate scenario having elections on the same day and the election commissions involvement will reduce unfair expenditure and put an end to endless extraction of funds for the elections from the students. In fact if the commission sets aside a share of its budget (with help from the central education ministry) exclusively for the campus elections, the dependence of the student union on the patron organization for funding is likely to reduce causing a relaxation on forceful implantation of the party ideology. It is time students should have their own set of students rights and perhaps a students right commission too.
There are both campuses notorious for turmoil during elections as well as illustrious for having peaceful elections in the country. This shows that once taken proper care of, it is not impossible to attain the later objective. Campuses like the Jawaharlal Nehru University and the Jadavpur University have traditionally shown the dearth of the large sums of money and the physical intimidation that tend to dominate student elections on the countrys other campuses but not the lack of space for a range of ideas and thoughts as well innovative campaigning on the basis of concretely defined ideologies. Hence freedom of political consciousness is never the reason of strife and removing the same not a solution to control the later.
Student movements have rewritten histories in many instances all over the world. The fruitful consciousness for attaining a voice to get heard in the crowded world can emerge only through the recognition of political rights. It is time we the Indian students fight for our rights and stand firmly in solidarity against our rights being made the scapegoats for corruption, inefficiencies and selfish ambitions.
Abhismita Sen recently completed her graduation from the Jadavpur University-Department of International Relations. In addition to being associated with several humanitarian and socio-political projects, she is currently placed as the Associate Director of the Alexis Centre for Public Policy and International Relations.