A Temporary Historical past of India’s Training System

Half 4F: Assault on Autonomy and Educational Freedom of Our Universities

[This article is a part of a series of articles on ‘India’s Education Journey: From Macaulay to NEP’. This is the tenth part of this series. The previous articles have been published in previous issues of Janata Weekly.]

Significance of Educational Freedom and Dissent in Universities

The Radhakrishnan Fee on Larger Training (1948–49) powerfully underscored the hyperlink between democracy and tutorial freedom in universities. It warned that “unique management of training by the State has been an essential think about facilitating the upkeep of totalitarian tyrannies”, and pressured that whereas the State has an obligation to assist increased training, “State help should not be confused with State management” (emphasis added). The Fee emphasised that mental progress relies on nurturing a “spirit of free inquiry” and the “pursuit and observe of reality, no matter penalties”, and known as for full freedom for lecturers “to talk on controversial points”—a necessary precept for cultivating a “morality of the thoughts” (Part 29).[102]

The Training Fee of 1964–66 additional deepened this imaginative and prescient. It provided a profound reflection on the social tasks of our universities:

Theirs is the pursuit of reality and excellence in all its variety—a pursuit which wants, above all, braveness and fearlessness. Nice universities and timid folks go unwell collectively…. (Part 11.01)

They have to be taught to attempt to function the ‘conscience of the nation’, as assessors of the nationwide lifestyle, and this duty turns into all of the larger within the absence of an enlightened public opinion … Universities are pre-eminently the discussion board for a crucial evaluation of society—sympathetic, goal, unafraid … (Part 11.04)

To fulfil these goals, it known as on universities to “encourage individuality, selection and dissent, inside a local weather of tolerance” (emphasis added), and to domesticate “free and disinterested considering which might problem vested pursuits and established methods” (Part 11.05).

The Fee additionally made insightful observations on the construction of governance wanted for universities to have the ability to fulfil their position in nation constructing:

The character of a college as a society of lecturers and college students engaged within the pursuit of studying and discovery distinguishes basically the regulation of its affairs from, say, the profit-motivated administration of business or industrial considerations or the administration of a authorities division, a municipal company, or a unit of the armed forces (Part 13.02).

The Kothari Fee strongly advocated autonomy for universities. It declared that solely an autonomous college—free from regimentation of concepts and political pressures—can successfully discharge its principal features of instructing, analysis and repair to the group, and “pursue reality fearlessly and construct up, in its lecturers and college students, habits of impartial considering and a spirit of enquiry” (emphasis added) (Part 13.07).

Making a distinction between college autonomy and tutorial freedom, the Fee supported the latter for lecturers, affirming that no instructor must be compelled to show one thing which works in opposition to their conscience or conflicts with their conception of reality. It additional said:

We’d additionally like to emphasize the liberty of lecturers to carry and categorical their views, nevertheless radical, throughout the classroom (and out of doors) offered they’re cautious to current the completely different elements of an issue with out complicated instructing with ‘propaganda’ in favour of their very own specific views. A instructor must be free to pursue and publish his research and analysis; and converse and write about and take part in debates on vital nationwide and worldwide points. He ought to obtain all services and encouragement in his work, instructing and analysis, even when his views and strategy be in opposition to these of his seniors and the top of his division or school (Part 13.03).[103]

Throughout the Nehruvian interval and even within the neoliberal many years (Nineties to 2014)—barring the Emergency—governments largely revered these rules. Political interference was restricted, universities largely loved autonomy, and governments didn’t try and impose their ideological leanings, affect appointments or curtail tutorial freedom.

Publish-2014: Suppressing Crucial Enquiry in Universities

This has fully modified through the previous decade. After the Narendra Modi-led BJP Authorities got here to energy on the Centre with an absolute majority in 2014, it started imposing its Hindutva ideology throughout all spheres of public life. For this, it wanted to silence all crucial enquiry. Since universities are essential areas for questioning authority and expressing dissent, the BJP has launched a vicious assault on our universities to convey them beneath its ideological management.

i) Proper-Wing Appointments to Educational and Cultural Establishments

This offensive started virtually instantly, in 2014 itself. Heads of premier tutorial, analysis and cultural our bodies have been swiftly changed with people affiliated with RSS-backed organisations, no matter tutorial credentials. The only real criterion was loyalty to the Hindutva ideology. Beneath are some placing examples:

• Y. Sudershan Rao, head of the Andhra Pradesh chapter of the RSS’s Akhil Bharatiya Itihas Sankalan Yojana and identified for his anti-Muslim views and assist for the caste system, was appointed the chief of the distinguished Indian Council of Historic Analysis (ICHR).
• Lokesh Chandra, an 87-year-old man, who known as Modi “an incarnation of God”, was appointed head of the Indian Council of Cultural Relations (ICCR).
• Baldev Sharma, former editor of the RSS mouthpiece Panchjanya, was made chairman of the Nationwide E-book Belief.
• Pahlaj Nihalani, finest identified for crafting the BJP election slogan “Har Ghar Modi, Ghar Ghar Modi”, was appointed chairperson of the Central Board of Movie Certification.
• Gajendra Chauhan, a C-grade actor with no severe inventive credentials, was appointed head of the Movie and Tv Institute of India (FTII).
• Chetan Chauhan, an ex-cricketer, former BJP MP and vice-president of the Delhi and District Cricket Affiliation, was made chair of the Nationwide Institute of Trend Know-how (NIFT).
• Braj Bihari Kumar, an obscure editor of Sangh journals, was made head of the Indian Council of Social Science Analysis (ICSSR)—regardless of being unknown within the nation’s social sciences fraternity.
• Eminent students who headed our bodies just like the Lalit Kala Akademi, the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, and the Nationwide Museum have been changed by people linked to Vivekananda Worldwide Basis and different Sangh associates.
• The Central Advisory Board of Training was reconstituted and full of yoga instructors, Sanskrit students and even actors.[104]

Vice-Chancellors of Central Universities—from Allahabad College and Banaras Hindu College to Hyderabad Central College and Jawaharlal Nehru College—have been compelled out and changed by RSS loyalists. Nobel laureate Amartya Sen was pressured to step down as Chancellor of Nalanda College.[105]

Even India’s finest science and know-how establishments weren’t spared. In December 2014, the Director of IIT Delhi, Dr. R.Okay. Shevgaonkar, resigned, probably due to rising interference by the RSS within the establishment. Two months later, nuclear scientist Anil Kakodkar resigned as chairman of the Board of Governors, IIT Bombay, accusing the HRD Ministry of an informal strategy and “wrongdoing” within the collection of IIT Administrators.[106]

At this time, the management of the Modi Authorities over our tutorial and cultural establishments is full. In keeping with a latest information report, round 80 % of Central College vice-chancellors now have RSS/BJP affiliations.[107]

ii) Assault on Educational Freedom

Till 2014—apart from the Emergency (1975–77) interregnum—tutorial freedom, although often curtailed, was by no means beneath severe menace. Governments usually avoided imposing ideological management on universities. College loved the liberty to show, pursue analysis initiatives of their selection with authorities funding and publish their work, converse, write and categorical their opinions, and organise and take part in conferences and seminars—with out worry of reprisal.

In sharp distinction, the present regime has aggressively imposed its Hindutva ideology on tutorial establishments. College and faculty administrations are routinely pressured to disclaim permission to packages that query BJP insurance policies or ideology. With compliant people appointed as heads of universities and different tutorial our bodies, this suppression has been straightforward. In establishments the place there was some resistance to those diktats, Hindu right-wing teams steadily organise militant protests forcing establishments to cancel even tutorial occasions.

A obvious instance is the 2017 incident at Ramjas School, considered one of Delhi College’s oldest and most revered schools. The school had organised a two-day seminar titled Cultures of Protest: Exploring Representations of Dissent. It was meant to be a celebration—of concepts, tales and debates round gender, of protests and particular person expressions of resistance, of the sanctity of college areas. The occasion was violently disrupted by the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the scholar wing of the BJP, forcing its cancellation.[108] The suitable-wing forces that dominate tutorial areas right now don’t need college students to be uncovered to the injustices in Indian society—like patriarchy, casteism, starvation, corruption, unemployment and oppression—fearing that college students could be drawn to the ethics of justice and the charms of dissent.

Such incidents have now turn out to be routine on campuses throughout the nation. In 2023, the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, needed to name off a dialogue on the Illegal Actions Prevention Act (UAPA), organised by its college students and college.[109] IIT-Bombay has cancelled a number of seminars and visitor lectures on subjects like environmental safety, the training system and concrete employment—topics that must be a elementary a part of tutorial dialogue in any college. The audio system whose talks have been cancelled embrace outstanding intellectuals like environmentalist and historian Ramachandra Guha, cultural activist Ganesh Devy, social scientist Dunu Roy and RTI activist Shailesh Gandhi (the latter two are additionally IIT alumni). An announcement by the student-run Ambedkar Periyar Phule Research Circle at IIT-Bombay notes that such cancellations have turn out to be routine, including that:

Even reading-sessions which have centered on nuances of caste, class or gender have been disrupted by the campus safety, or unilaterally cancelled.[110]

Extra not too long ago, in April 2024, a sequence of talks on the Muktiparv competition at IISER Pune celebrating the legacy of Babasaheb Ambedkar and different social reformers was cancelled after the ABVP objected to among the invited audio system, accusing them of being “anti-nationals”.[111]

College administrations have even initiated disciplinary motion in opposition to organisers of occasions seen by them as ‘anti-national’. In 2017, Prof. Rajshri Ranawat of Jai Narain Vyas College, Jodhpur invited Jawaharlal Nehru College (JNU) professor Nivedita Menon to talk at a convention organised by her on the college. The very subsequent day, the governing physique of the college issued a show-cause discover to her for inviting an “anti-national”, and shortly after, suspended her.[112]

The more and more illiberal and anti-intellectual ambiance in our tutorial establishments is making it tough for lecturers to debate even primary points. In a 2023 incident at a Kolhapur faculty, a professor advised college students in her class that heinous crimes might be dedicated by folks from any faith or group. Quickly after, a doctored video of her remarks began circulating on-line. Bowing to public stress, the faculty administration requested the professor to apologise, a requirement she refused. She was then reportedly compelled to do business from home till tensions eased.[113]

In 2021, the Union Ministry of Training issued a directive requiring authorities approval for all on-line tutorial occasions or conferences going down at or with the participation of government-funded establishments. The occasions couldn’t talk about inner affairs, delicate points or issues of nationwide safety. Following widespread backlash from lecturers, the order was later withdrawn.

This assault on tutorial freedom is affecting analysis in universities too. Analysis supervisors are not free to determine analysis subjects. Generally, universities themselves present subjects which can be explicitly pro-government and promote its political positions and politics.[114] A professor at Jamia Millia Islamia (Delhi) not too long ago described the educational ambiance within the college as “suffocating”, marked by “censorship and monitoring of analysis subjects chosen by college students.”[115] In 2019, Professor Meena T. Pillai resigned from the Board of Research of English and Comparative Literature on the Central College of Kerala. She stop in protest in opposition to a round issued by the Union Ministry of Human Useful resource Growth asking vice-chancellors to “discourage analysis in irrelevant areas.” In an interview, she requested, “Who decides what’s related and irrelevant? … Analysis can also be critique, dissent and the fitting to ask questions. The second you begin deciding what areas of analysis one ought to restrict oneself to, the place is the educational freedom of the researcher?”[116]

In 2023, the UGC barred Ph.D. scholarships for college students researching “politically delicate” subjects akin to Kashmir, caste and Hindutva.[117]

Even the South Asian College (SAU)—a prestigious establishment established in New Delhi by SAARC, a regional bloc of eight South Asian nations—has not been spared from tutorial arm-twisting by the Modi Authorities. In 2024, a Ph.D. scholar at SAU was issued a showcause discover over his analysis proposal on Kashmir’s ethnography and politics that cited American scholar Noam Chomsky’s critique of the Modi regime. A disciplinary inquiry was additionally initiated in opposition to the scholar’s supervisor, Prof. Sasanka Perera, a famend Sri Lankan anthropologist and a senior school member on the SAU for 13 years. Calling the costs “trumped-up and irrational”, Prof. Perera resigned, stating that he had no hope of receiving a good course of or justice. Quickly after, the scholar too withdrew from the programme.[118]

iii) Personal Universities Below Assault

This assault on tutorial freedom in our public universities has now prolonged to non-public universities as effectively. Their governing our bodies—principally full of enterprise donors—are being pressured to intervene in tutorial issues and curb analysis crucial of the Modi Authorities.

Ashoka College, thought of to be considered one of India’s premier liberal arts universities, has seen a number of high-profile resignations over this problem. In 2021, political scientist Pratap Bhanu Mehta resigned. In his resignation letter, Mehta wrote that after a gathering with the college’s founders, it turned clear that they noticed him as a “political legal responsibility”. A globally revered scholar, Mehta has taught at Harvard, JNU and the New York College College of Regulation, and serves on the editorial boards of a number of main tutorial journals.

Two days later, famous economist and founding director of the Ashoka Centre for Financial Coverage, Arvind Subramanian, additionally resigned. In his resignation letter to the college, he raised the priority that “even Ashoka—with its non-public standing and backing by non-public capital—can not present an area for educational expression and freedom is ominously disturbing.”[119]

In 2023, tutorial freedom on the college as soon as once more got here into query when Sabyasachi Das, Assistant Professor of Economics, printed a analysis paper suggesting attainable electoral fraud by the BJP within the 2019 common elections. The paper garnered broad consideration on social media, and led to a right-wing backlash, following which the college distanced itself from the paper. Quickly after, Das resigned. Every week later, one other economics professor, Pulapre Balakrishnan, additionally resigned in protest.[120]

These occasions strike on the coronary heart of what a college must be—an autonomous house totally free expression, crucial inquiry and the fearless pursuit of data.

iv) Imposing Authorities Programmes on Universities

Whereas actively suppressing programmes that encourage crucial debate, query Hindutva ideology or promote Constitutional values, the Modi regime has concurrently sought to impose its ideology on increased training establishments—primarily by way of the College Grants Fee (UGC).

The mandate of the UGC is to advertise and coordinate the sector of upper training, decide and keep high quality and requirements, and supply funding to increased training establishments. It’s not supposed to provide directions on what sort of programmes and seminars must be held in a college. However now, the Modi Authorities has reworked it right into a software for presidency propaganda. It has been issuing directives to universities to organise occasions that promote the ruling occasion’s ideology.

First got here the order to rejoice Swachh Bharat Diwas on October 2. Then got here orders to organise Nationwide Unity Day on October 31, the birthday of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel; Good Governance Day on December 25, Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s birthday; and Worldwide Yoga Day on June 21.

In November 2022, the UGC went a step additional, directing establishments to organise meditation classes for college students and lecturers utilizing strategies developed by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s Artwork of Residing Basis—elevating considerations that the UGC was selling non-public non secular organisations.

In December 2023, universities have been ordered to arrange selfie factors with life-size cutouts of the Prime Minister, purportedly to spotlight India’s achievements—particularly these linked to NEP-2020. Earlier, in early 2023, establishments had additionally been instructed to organise programmes showcasing India’s presidency of the G-20 Summit.

In January 2024, the UGC directed universities and schools to put in the Union Authorities’s Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (BBBP) brand on their premises.

To instil ‘nationalism’ amongst college students—the Modi Authorities in all probability feels that college students lack this—universities have been ordered to arrange ‘gallantry partitions’ displaying portraits of adorned armed forces personnel and completely show the nationwide flag on the campus on 207-foot flagpoles, in order that it may be seen from afar.

In a very blatant try to advertise Hindutva ideology, the UGC instructed all increased academic establishments to organise seminars and lectures on “India: Mom of Democracy” on Structure Day, 26 November 2022, utilizing an idea word ready by the ICHR. The ICHR’s pointers portrayed India because the oldest democracy on the earth, with supposedly democratic traditions rooted in khap panchayats, Vedic governance and rule by “perfect kings”. The idea word even asserted that Indian civilisation has existed “from time immemorial,” and claimed this antiquity as proof of its democratic greatness. Along with imposing the official historic interpretation on universities and undermining their tutorial autonomy, the narrative additionally mythologised historic Indian historical past and aligned it with the Modi regime’s ideological targets.

The UGC suspects that lecturers may not comply, since its orders are nonetheless framed as strategies. Due to this fact, pictures or movies of all such programmes essentially must be despatched to the Fee and the Ministry of Training. [121]

v) Saffronisation of Universities

The Modi Authorities is searching for to saffronise the whole tutorial and cultural ambiance in our universities. In an article titled “How the UGC Creates Consensus for the Ruling Regime”, Delhi College (DU) professor Apoorvanand describes how even instructor orientation and refresher programmes—meant to familiarise educators with cutting-edge analysis—now characteristic lectures by RSS leaders. Throughout these classes, attendees are made to chant slogans like “Chinese language items, talaq, talaq, talaq” and pledge allegiance to the concept of Akhand Bharat. He additional notes:

Within the schools of Delhi College, speeches by RSS leaders are organised and lecturers are anticipated to attend them. Now Vice-Chancellors, Deans and Heads of Departments, with out ready for orders, themselves organise such programmes to make sure their presence is registered within the eyes of the RSS management. Students making use of for instructing posts actively take part in or organise such programmes to show their loyalty to the RSS. They enlist and mobilise college students and lecturers for RSS programmes.[122]

A placing instance occurred on 16 January 2025, when DU hosted the launch of the ebook Modi vs. Khan Market Gang. The time period ‘Khan Market Gang’ has been utilized by PM Modi to disparage his critics. The Vice-Chancellor and senior college officers shared the stage with BJP leaders, turning the occasion right into a BJP marketing campaign to malign critics of the Modi regime—lots of whom are school members.[123]

Whereas programmes selling crucial thought are forcibly cancelled, occasions celebrating superstitions, communal views on Indian historical past and different components of Hindutva ideology are being brazenly organised. At IIT-Bombay, the Gender Cell was pressured into cancelling a panel dialogue that includes rape survivor Bhanwari Devi, creator–activist Kavita Srivastava and lawyer Vrinda Grover—all famend progressive voices. Remarkably, the identical institute endorsed a lecture on Garbhavigyan—the so-called science of begetting an excellent progeny—delivered by Ayurveda proponent Acharya Mehul Shastri.[124] One more obvious instance of how crucial, socially engaged discourse is being suppressed whereas ideologically pushed, pseudo-scientific content material aligned with Hindutva narratives is promoted even in India’s most prestigious tutorial establishments.

Spiritual ceremonies have begun to pervade our college areas. In January 2024, a number of establishments, together with IIT-Delhi and DU schools, performed ceremonies celebrating the Ayodhya consecration—full with havan, candle lighting, Ramayan recitals and processions. In January 2025, DU’s Daulat Ram School held a perform to mark the primary anniversary of the consecration, attended by the principal and representatives of the RSS and BJP.[125]

The saffron agenda has now gone past rituals and is being embedded into tutorial curricula. In universities throughout the nation, together with our famed Central Universities and IITs, programs in astrology, vastu shastra, rituals and “historic sciences” have proliferated:

• UP Rajarshi Tandon Open College (Prayagraj) has launched a program on spiritual texts and rituals.
• Nehru Gram Bharati College (Prayagraj) and Banaras Hindu College (Varanasi) have launched diplomas in Karmakand.
• Lucknow College added Karmakand as a vocational course in 2020–21.
• In 2023–24, Allahabad College introduced new programs in Hindu astrology, vastu shastra and rituals.[126]
• IIT Kharagpur’s Centre of Excellence for Indian Data System now presents undergraduate and post-graduate programs in Vastu Vidya, Paribesh Vidya and Arthashastra.
• In 2025, Delhi College launched Dharmashastra Research, that includes Manusmriti as a main textual content, with college students being taught how the varna and caste system “organise society”.[127]

Hindutva-linked pseudo-science has additionally infiltrated the analysis labs of prestigious establishments. At IIT-Delhi’s Centre for Rural Growth and Know-how, the government-funded Scientific Validation and Analysis on Panchgavya undertaking is making an attempt to ‘show’ that cows take up poisonous metals into their flesh, cow urine can treatment dengue and cow-dung bricks can take up ultraviolet radiation.[128]

This assault is eroding the secular character of our campuses. In 2022, at Authorities New Regulation School, Indore, the ABVP launched a focused marketing campaign in opposition to 4 Muslim professors, accusing them of “selling Islamic tradition”, and even “love jihad”. It additionally objected to the “excessive variety of Muslim” lecturers within the faculty, although solely 4 of the 28 school members have been Muslim. The ABVP additionally attacked the faculty principal, Prof. Inamur Rahman, a Muslim, for retaining an instructional ebook crucial of the RSS within the faculty library. With the State House Minister supporting the ABVP agitation, the police filed a case in opposition to the principal, finally forcing him to resign. The Supreme Courtroom later stayed his arrest and, in Could 2024, quashed the FIR, calling it an “absurdity”.

Such incidents of bigotry in opposition to minority college students and lecturers are actually alarmingly widespread throughout Indian campuses.[129]

vi) ‘Surgical Strike’ on Science Establishments

The Modi Authorities shouldn’t be solely undermining India’s premier social science establishments; its battle on the mind now extends to the pure sciences as effectively.

The lead has come from the very prime, with the Prime Minister himself claiming that historic Indians invented cosmetic surgery and in-vitro fertilisation. In 2014, he appointed as Minister for Science and Know-how a person who believes the Vedas comprise theories superior to Einstein’s E=mc²—a declare he made not in non-public, however publicly on the Indian Science Congress. This annual assembly is famed because the nation’s most in depth gathering of premier scientific minds, and is commonly attended by Nobel laureates too. Nevertheless, lately, this annual occasion has seen displays by the S&T Minister’s ideological kinsmen asserting that historic Indians had invented airplanes, guided missiles, radars and stem cell analysis. Nobel laureate Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, after attending the 2015 Congress, described it as “a circus … the place little or no science was mentioned,” and vowed by no means to return.[130] This hocus-pocus, championed by Union Ministers and inspired by the Prime Minister, is inflicting grave—and maybe lasting—injury on scientific considering in India.

The distinction with India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, couldn’t be starker. For Nehru, science was central to constructing a self-reliant and fashionable nation. Whereas he wished to salvage no matter was constructive in India’s custom and tradition, he firmly rejected spiritual dogma and orthodoxy that hindered progress. In an incisive article printed within the Deccan Herald (7 February 2019), Prasenjit Chowdhury compares Narendra Modi with Nehru—whose legacy Modi likes to debunk as having prompted the nation nice misery:

Nehru left India with the world’s second-largest pool of skilled scientists and engineers. Males like Homi Bhabha and Vikram Sarabhai constructed the platform beneath Nehru’s tutelage for Indian accomplishments within the fields of atomic vitality and house analysis…. Modi, in his try and negate Nehru who was famous for his imaginative and prescient to encourage a scientific mood, has chosen as an alternative to mainstream pseudo-scientific orthodoxies.[131]

vii) Silencing Dissent

Indian civilisation, from historic occasions, has been an never-ending celebration of plurality—the notion that there are a lot of methods of taking a look at and residing on the earth. The Rigvedic verse, “Aano Bhadrah Kratvo Yantu Vishwatah” (Let noble ideas come to us from all instructions), expresses the attitude that there are a lot of completely different concepts and truths unfold everywhere in the world and they’re all welcome. The famed saying present in a number of historic Hindu texts from the Maha Upanishad to the Bhagavad Gita, “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam” (The world is one household), embraces all of humanity—and subsequently each thought, emotion and way of life that exists. In medieval India, the Bhakti and Sufi actions have been directed in opposition to monopolies of reality and powerfully challenged spiritual dogma. Indian data techniques have thus all the time thought of reality to be many-sided and believed that a number of methods result in it. Dissenters weren’t solely tolerated but in addition accorded an equal standing, as Romila Thapar paperwork in her acclaimed essay, Voices of Dissent.

At this time, this spirit of pluralism is beneath assault. Hindutva ideologues are mutilating this philosophical way of living that’s so elementary to Indian civilisation in addition to Hindu faith, and searching for to stifle debate and dissent on our campuses. This crackdown started quickly after the Modi Authorities got here to energy in 2014.

In Could 2015, beneath stress from the HRD Ministry, IIT Madras banned a scholar group, Ambedkar–Periyar Research Circle (APSC), accusing it of sowing disaffection in opposition to the Prime Minister and “Hindus”.[132] In January 2016, Rohith Vemula, a Dalit analysis scholar on the College of Hyderabad, dedicated suicide after months of harassment and intimidation by the ABVP in alliance with the campus authorities. Rohith and 4 different Dalit college students had been evicted from their hostel in August 2015, had their month-to-month analysis stipends suspended and confronted escalating institutional stress. All 4 belonged to the Ambedkar College students Affiliation and have been energetic on the campus throughout a spread of points.[133]

In February 2016, the ABVP orchestrated a marketing campaign in opposition to progressive scholar teams in JNU—concentrating on the college’s long-standing legacy as an area totally free thought and dissent. JNU College students’ Union president Kanhaiya Kumar was arrested and charged with sedition, based mostly on a doctored video that falsely confirmed him shouting anti-India slogans. (Forensic consultants later confirmed the video had been manipulated.) Proper-wing media instantly launched a relentless marketing campaign to malign the college as a “hotbed of anti-nationals”.[134]

Since then, the ABVP and different right-wing scholar outfits have mounted a scientific assault on dissenting scholar teams in universities throughout the nation, typically with police complicity—to stifle crucial thought and silence all opposition to right-wing political ideology.

On 15 December 2019, through the nationwide anti-CAA–NRC protests by which college students from Jamia Millia Islamia College (Delhi) participated in big numbers, the police and paramilitary forces stormed the Jamia Millia campus and beat up college students, even those that have been quietly finding out within the library. Tons of of scholars have been injured.[135]

In 2020, masked assailants armed with sticks and rods rampaged by way of the JNU campus, assaulting college students and lecturers for practically three hours, whereas the police watched passively.[136] In February 2025, ABVP members attacked college students and mess workers on the SAU for serving non-vegetarian meals throughout Maha Shivratri.[137]

College administrations are additionally imposing restrictions on scholar activism. In December 2023, the JNU administration barred wall posters and staging of dharnas inside 100 metres of educational buildings, imposing steep fines and threatening expulsion. The SAU is now asking all new college students to provide a written pledge that they won’t take part in any protests throughout their time on the college. From August 2024, the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, has requested college students to signal an enterprise promising to not bask in any “political, anti-establishment, unpatriotic” actions, with the specter of disciplinary motion.[138]

Lecturers are additionally being attacked in the event that they take part in any protest or converse at an occasion that questions authorities insurance policies or its functioning. The Instances Larger Training Complement (London) in 2022 reported a number of situations of lecturers being reprimanded by college officers for publicly criticising authorities insurance policies.[139] In July 2018, JNU issued present trigger notices to 48 school members for collaborating in a protest in opposition to the Vice-Chancellor’s insurance policies. A lot of them, after retirement, had their pensions and retirement advantages arbitrarily withheld. Compelled to hunt authorized recourse to say what was rightfully theirs, many are nonetheless awaiting justice.[140] This rising criminalisation of dissent has led to deep worry and alienation amongst lecturers. Professors are actually ‘self-censoring’ themselves even in school rooms, uncertain if they’re being recorded or surveilled.

Although earlier regimes did intervene within the functioning of universities, that is the primary time (excluding the Emergency) that the Central authorities has unleashed such a widespread and coordinated marketing campaign to crush the freedoms loved by universities—utilizing each State equipment and violent vigilante teams to silence dissenting voices.

Steep Fall in Educational Freedom Index

India’s sharp decline in tutorial freedom is mirrored in its plummeting rank on the Educational Freedom Index (AFI), a worldwide research by researchers on the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität (Germany) and the V-Dem Institute (Sweden). It’s a collaborative research drawing on the experience of two,363 students worldwide and tracks tutorial freedom in 179 nations. The report measures nations on the next elements: freedom to analysis and train; freedom of educational change and dissemination; institutional autonomy; campus integrity; and freedom of educational and cultural expression.

India’s rating dropped from 0.58 in 2015 (inserting it within the prime 50 %) to only 0.16 in 2024—rating it 156^th out of 179 nations, within the backside 15 % globally. The 2025 report categorises India as a rustic the place tutorial freedom is “fully restricted”.[141]

We Have to Save Our Universities

Universities will not be simply buildings the place instructing takes place—they’re crucibles for shaping younger minds into considerate, socially acutely aware residents. Their position is to encourage college students to query obtained wisdoms, problem entrenched orthodoxies, interrogate all types of dominant ideology and maintain energy to account. Such fearless inquiry is the lifeblood of democratic life, an important examine on the abuse of energy. Because the Kothari Fee so memorably put it, “Universities are pre-eminently the discussion board for a crucial evaluation of society” (emphasis added). The federal government, in flip, has a duty to nurture and defend these areas of free thought.

However right now, the Modi Authorities is destroying college freedom—curbing tutorial freedom, suppressing criticism of presidency insurance policies, stifling dissent—and searching for to show our universities into echo chambers of official ideology.

The Kothari Fee had emphasised the essential position of training in selling a scientific outlook in direction of life and tradition. “Science,” it wrote, “strengthens the dedication of man to free enquiry and to the hunt for reality as his highest obligation and obligation. It loosens the bonds of dogmatism and acts as a robust dispeller of worry and superstition” (Part 1.24).[142] Sadly, right now, the federal government is selling pseudoscience and pressurising universities to suppress any questioning of the dogmas and superstitions on the coronary heart of the Hindutva worldview.

The Fee had envisioned training as a automobile to instil democratic values—tolerance, mutual respect, and cultural variety (Part 1.68).[143] As a substitute, right now, our campuses are witnessing the imposition of a slim, majoritarian ideology and a gradual erosion of their secular, democratic character.

The Fee had emphasised that the character of a college is basically completely different from that of a profit-driven enterprise. Tragically, right now, our universities are more and more changing into simply that. Lecturers have been decreased to informal wage staff in an training manufacturing unit that daunts crucial considering and trains college students to turn out to be obedient cogs in a machine that endlessly spins them round in circles of alienation and conformity.

The Kothari Fee had envisioned universities as establishments that promote equality and social justice. However the privatisation of upper training has betrayed this promise. As charges soar, training is changing into inaccessible to college students from marginalised communities. Universities have gotten the protect of dominant castes and lessons, deepening the very inequalities they have been meant to problem.

This commodification of upper training basically transforms the connection between the educated and the remainder of society. Our nation’s founders had visualised the college as an establishment that would offer society with competent women and men skilled in numerous professions, who would even be residents imbued with a dedication to societal well-being. However profit-driven non-public establishments can’t instil such a spirit of social concern of their college students. College students, having paid exorbitant charges, view increased training as an funding that’s anticipated to yield most returns. Society, for them, is nothing greater than a market the place they have to extract the very best attainable returns, not a group to which they owe any duty. And so, right now, intellectuals chase promotions, awards and company favours, even when it means betraying the pursuits of the very folks they’re meant to serve.

To conclude, universities will not be mere centres of studying. They have interaction vigorously and fearlessly within the pursuit of reality, interpret previous data and beliefs within the gentle of latest discoveries, and protect and promote cherished values. They’re foundational to nation-building. They’re centres the place a society moulds its subsequent technology to think about and construct a extra humane, democratic and harmonious society.

At this time, this imaginative and prescient is in peril. Hindutva neoliberalism has launched a multi-pronged assault on our universities—substandard RSS loyalists are being appointed to prime tutorial positions, impartial analysis is being curbed, tutorial freedom is being restricted, dissent is being crushed and ideological conformity is being imposed, making analysis not simply within the social sciences but in addition within the pure sciences inconceivable. This isn’t solely destroying the colourful democratic ethos that prevailed in our universities earlier, it has additionally lowered their tutorial requirements. Consequently, our greatest universities—just like the College of Delhi which arguably had probably the greatest undergraduate instructing programmes on the earth, the Jawaharlal Nehru College which pioneered an instructional discourse within the social sciences in India that challenged the hegemony of the metropolis and Viswa Bharati which was infused with the imaginative and prescient of Rabindranath Tagore—are actually decreased to mere shadows of their former selves.

India’s post-independence leaders, led by Nehru, constructed among the most interesting universities and different increased training establishments within the creating world. In only a decade, the BJP–RSS led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has destroyed them. That is in all probability one of many worst damages brought on by the Modi regime to Indian society and polity.

Lecturers, college students and residents who consider within the values of our Structure should come collectively to avoid wasting our universities from this multi-pronged assault. The battle for our universities is, finally, a battle for the way forward for our democracy.

Notes

102. The Report of the College Training Fee (December 1948 – August 1949), op. cit., p. 42.
103. Report of the Training Fee 1964–66, op. cit., pp. 274–76, 325–26.
104. Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprashasta, “Corrosive Agenda at Work”, Frontline, 12 June 2015, http://www.frontline.in; A.G. Noorani,“India’s Sawdust Caesar”, Frontline, 25 December 2015, http://www.frontline.in; Adrija Bose, “Seen Pahlaj Nihalani’s Tribute to PM Modi? Listed here are 11 Issues Which are Not Indian within the Video”, HuffPost India, 15 November 2015, http://www.huffingtonpost.in; Soumya Shankar, “The Takeover: How the Modi Govt has Crammed Key Positions in 14 Establishments”, 8 July 2015, http://www.catchnews.com; Swetha Ramakrishnan, “FTII Chairman Gajendra Chauhan’s Epic Filmography: A Profession in Forgettable Cameos”, 18 June 2015, http://www.firstpost.com; Ziya Us Salam, “It’s Simply Not style”, 6 July 2016, http://www.frontline.in; Sruti M.D., “The Mediocrity of the ICSSR Below Modi”, 15 July 2017, https://sabrangindia.in.
105. See for instance: Kritika Sharma, “Sackings, Inquiries, Compelled Depart: Central College V-Cs Face the Drive of Modi Govt”, 3 November 2018, https://theprint.in; “Amartya Sen Quits Nalanda Varsity, Says Authorities Doesn’t Need Me”, 20 February 2015, http://www.business-standard.com.
106. “Anil Kakodkar Rebuts HRD Minister Smriti Irani: I’m Out of the Course of”, 23 Could 2015, http://indianexpress.com; “How Baba Ramdev, and a Proxy Hindutva Agenda, Have Entered IIT Delhi”, 19 July 2015, http://www.kractivist.org; Divya Trivedi, “Personnel Issues”, Frontline, 19 February 2016, http://www.frontline.in.
107. “Editorial: Our Varsity Wasteland”, 21 April 2025, https://www-dtnext-in.
108. Syed Areesh Ahmad, “Ramjas and the Purge of Dissent”, 9 March 2017, https://www.thehinducentre.com; “Ramjas School Seminar Cancelled After ABVP, DUSU Protest for Inviting JNU Scholar Umar Khalid”, 21 February 2017, https://www.scoopwhoop.com.
109. C.P. Rajendran, “The Fading Position of Universities as Conscience of Society”, 18 January 2024, https://www.thehindu.com.
110. Aarefa Johari, “Free Fall in India’s Educational Freedom Rating is Mirrored in Cancelled Lectures at IIT Bombay and Elsewhere”, 10 October 2024, https://article-14.com.
111. “IISER Pune Cancels Ambedkarite Talks After ABVP Criticism”, 15 April 2025, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com.
112. “Jodhpur: College Professor Suspended for Inviting JNU’s Nivedita Menon to a Convention”, 16 February 2017, https://scroll.in.
113. P. Goyal, “Kolhapur Lecturer ‘Compelled’ to Go on Depart for Saying Rapists ‘might be from Any Faith”, Newslaundry, 30 June 2023, https://www.newslaundry.com; P. Tupe, “How Maharashtra’s Girls Teachers are Resisting the Hate Narrative”, 24 September 2024, https://behanbox.com.
114. Zoya Hasan, “Political Intolerance and Declining Educational Freedom in India”, 19 March 2025, https://www.thehinducentre.com.
115. Mir Umar, “As soon as Bastions of Dissent, Indian Universities Now Face a Suffocating Surroundings of Surveillance and Censorship”, 2 April 2024, https://frontline.thehindu.com.
116. “Amid Ashoka College Row, a Take a look at Professors Who Give up Their Posts in Protest”, 18 August 2023, https://indianexpress.com.
117. “Editorial: Our Varsity Wasteland”, op. cit.
118. “PhD Scholar Withdraws from South Asian College Amid Kashmir Analysis Proposal Row”, 6 March 2025, https://thewire.in.
119. Shreya Basak, “Revisiting Pratap Bhanu Mehta’s Resignation as Ashoka College Faces Warmth Over Electoral Manipulation Paper”, 11 August 2023, https://www.outlookindia.com; “Amid Ashoka College Row, a Take a look at Professors Who Give up Their Posts in Protest”, op. cit.
120. Kamaljit Kaur Sandhu, “Ashoka College College Members Threaten Exodus Over Analysis Paper Row”, 16 August 2023, https://www.indiatoday.in; “Ashoka College Accepts Resignation of Writer of Paper on Potential ‘Manipulation’ in 2019 Polls”, 15 August 2023, https://thewire.in.
121. Apoorvanand, “How the UGC Creates Consensus for the Ruling Regime”, 14 December 2022, https://frontline.thehindu.com; C.P. Rajendran, “The Fading Position of Universities as Conscience of Society”, op. cit.; “Set Up Selfie Factors with PM Picture in Background: UGC”, 3 December 2023, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com.
122. Apoorvanand, ibid.
123. Apoorvanand, “A Controversial ‘E-book Launch’ and Delhi College’s Descent Into Celebration Propaganda”, 21 January 2025, https://thewire.in.
124. Amey Tirodkar, “IIT Bombay’s ‘Garbhavigyan’ Lecture: A Reflection of ‘Saffronisation’ of Instructional Campuses?”, 18 January 2025, https://frontline.thehindu.com.
125. There are a number of articles obtainable on the web on these packages. See for example: “On Campuses in Delhi, Scholar Teams Plan Havan, Deepotsav”, 23 January 2024, https://indianexpress.com; “In DU’s Daulat Ram School, College students Witness Saffronisation of a ‘Protected Place’”, 24 January 2025, https://thewire.in.
126. “UPRTOU to Launch Course on Hindu Rituals”, 5 October 2023, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com; “With Eye on Jobs as Purohits Forward of Ram Temple Opening, UP College students Present Curiosity in Programs on Hindu Rituals”, 4 August 2023, https://indianexpress.com; “U.P.: Allahabad College Plans Devoted Centre for Vedic Research”, 1 August 2022, https://www.hindustantimes.com.
127. Santanu Chowdhury, “Launched Days In the past, IIT Centre in Calendar Row Presents Programs in Vastu Vidya, Arthashastra”, 30 December 2021, https://indianexpress.com; “DU’s New Course ‘Dharmashastra Research’ Has Manusmriti, Different Hindu Spiritual Literature in Syllabus”, 12 June 2025, https://thewire.in.
128. Shreya Roy Chowdhury, “Urine Capsules, Dung Insect Repellent: Meet the Folks Behind IIT-Delhi’s Cow Analysis Venture”, 21 February 2017, https://scroll.in.
129. “BJP-Led State Governments Resorting to Communal Cleaning of Instructional Establishments”, 8 December 2022, https://www.nationalheraldindia.com; ‘Ex-Regulation School Principal Booked Over ‘Hinduphobic’ E-book Will get SC Reduction”, 17 Could 2024, https://indianexpress.com.
130. Ramachandra Guha, “Surgical Strike In opposition to Science and Scholarship”, 27 April 2019, https://www.telegraphindia.com; Niladry Sarkar, “Indian Science Congress Postponed Amid Tussle with Centre’s Science and Know-how Division”, 17 February 2024, https://scroll.in; “Science Congress a Circus: Nobel Winner Venkatraman Ramakrishnan”, 6 January 2016, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com; “Rishi has Given Tips to Make Planes”, 16 November 2021, https://www.thehindu.com.
131. Prasenjit Chowdhury, “Modi and Indian Science: A Legacy Finest Forgotten”, 7 February 2019, https://www.deccanherald.com.
132. Arun Janardhanan, “IIT-Madras Reprimands College students’ Physique That Criticised Narendra Modi and Saffronisation”, 29 Could 2015, https://indianexpress.com.
133. “The Letter of ‘Intolerance’ from a Minister That Led to Rohith Vemula’s Demise”, The Citizen Bureau, 19 January 2016, https://www.thecitizen.in.
134. “Govt. Acts Powerful, JNU Scholar Chief Charged with Sedition”, 28 November 2021, https://www.thehindu.com; Shruti Kaushik, “How Police Use Unverified Movies to Allege Sedition”, 27 August 2021, https://article-14.com; “Debunking the Viral Video of ‘Sedition’ That has Captivated India”, 18 February 2016, https://www.bbc.com; Ishan Marvel, “How the ABVP Introduced the State into JNU”, 3 March 2016, https://caravanmagazine.in.
135. Nehal Ahmed and Grace Raju, “‘We Heard Gunfire’: Jamia College students Element Police Assault on Campus”, 18 December 2019, https://www.aljazeera.com.
136. “Masked Mob Assaults JNU; Round 24 Together with College students, Lecturers Injured”, 6 January 2020, https://www.ndtv.com.; “As It Occurred: Masked Goons Strike Terror in JNU, None Arrested”, 6 January 2020, https://www.thehindu.com.
137. “College students ‘Attacked’, Ruckus at South Asian College as ABVP vs SFI Conflict Over Meals Menu”, 26 February 2025, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com.
138. “‘I’m Mentally Sound, Gained’t Protest’; SAU Seeks Endeavor From College students”, 29 July 2023, https://www.freepressjournal.in; Mir Umar, “As soon as Bastions of Dissent, Indian Universities Now Face a Suffocating Surroundings of Surveillance and Censorship”, op. cit.; Pallavi Good, “TISS Revises Honour Code: Bans Participation in ‘Anti-Institution’, ‘Unpatriotic’ Discussions”, 4 September 2024, https://indianexpress.com.
139. Pola Lem, “Students ‘Reprimanded by Universities’ for Criticising Indian Authorities”, 20 July 2022, https://www.timeshighereducation.com.
140. Zoya Hasan, “Political Intolerance and Declining Educational Freedom in India”, op. cit.
141. Ibid.; Kavita Chowdhury, “Plummeting Educational Freedom and Autonomy in Modi’s India”, 24 April 2025, https://thediplomat.com.
142. Report of the Training Fee 1964–66, op. cit., p. 7.
143. Ibid., p. 17.

[Neeraj Jain is a social activist and writer. He is the convenor of Lokayat, an activist group based in Pune. He is also the editor of Janata Weekly, India’s oldest socialist magazine. He has authored several books, including Globalisation or Recolonisation?, Education Under Globalisation: Burial of the Constitutional Dream, Nuclear Energy: Technology from Hell, and most recently, Union Budgets 2014-24: An Analysis.]