Central University TN expels student from hostel over placard against PM Modi

Students have alleged that the move, which comes three months after the on-campus protest, is in the wake of the pressure exerted on the university by right wing groups.
Protest representative image
Protest representative image
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The Central University of Tamil Nadu in Tiruvarur has expelled an MSc final year student from the university hostel, allegedly for organising a torch-bearing protest in which students had held placards against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The expelled student is part of a student organisation named the Freedom Speakers Study Circle, which had organised the protest on April 11 to condemn the attack on JNU students by the ABVP during Ram Navami. One placard used during the protest had a cartoon of Modi, which said “Modi face of Indian terrorism”. Three months after the incident, one of the students who organised this protest has now been expelled from the university hostel.

According to students at the university, approximately 300 students had taken part in the protest which started at 7 pm on April 11. An open discussion was also held on this matter. Students had raised several placards and slogans as part of the protest, a few of which were against the BJP government. Later on April 28, members of the disciplinary committee at the varsity had summoned three post-graduate students, who were seen holding the placard against Modi in a picture, which later became the cause for the controversy. The students allege that Committee members threatened them and asked them the names of those who had organised the protest rally. Even though the students explained that they had only come to pose for pictures, the committee members called their parents and threatened that the students could be arrested for sedition anytime.

“With no choice left, the students had to give our names to the committee,” says Vijay (name changed), one of the organisers of the protest who has now been expelled from the hostel. “The Freedom Speakers Study Circle is not a big student body. Usually, one or two students take up the responsibility to organise events to discuss the issues that are happening on campus as well as across the nation, while other students come and share their opinions. It was me and another senior student who organised the protest in question, and both of us had to appear before the disciplinary committee on May 4,” he tells TNM.

At the disciplinary committee meeting, Vijay and the other student were probed separately with the same set of questions. “They showed me a video of me raising slogans, and also a circular citing conditions that any other activity other than academic ones were strictly prohibited inside the campus. They asked me why I was violating campus guidelines, and told me to focus on my studies and that I was not here to participate in any protests,” Vijay recalls.

Two months later, on July 1, Vijay received a notice from the administration stating that he has been expelled from the CUTN Men's Hostel for the rest of the academic year (2022-2023). “After I received the expulsion notice from the university, I had reached out to them for an explanation. They told me to wait and that they would reconsider the matter. But I don't know if they will let me back into the hostel,” he says.

The other student, who had organised the protest along with Vijay, tells TNM that he had been questioned by the disciplinary committee for an hour, while Vijay was interrogated for about 15 minutes with the same questions. “The University did not take any action for two months. The move came right after other students conducted an anti-Agneepath protest (against the Union government’s new Army recruitment scheme) inside the campus. A huge police force had assembled on campus upon the instruction of the Vice Chancellor," he says.

Response from the university

The varsity’s disciplinary committee consists of professor T Mohan Das, Proctor and HOD of the Department of Chemistry, and MP Balamurugan, Joint Registrar. When TNM reached out to Mohan Das, he said that he was not authorised to speak further on the issue, and that it was not his decision alone to expel Vijay from the hostel.

“The disciplinary committee had to get involved in the matter because the students had made placards with objectionable and derogatory comments against the Prime Minister. After the inquiry, the committee decided to expel the student from the hostel, but not from the university,” said CUTN’s Public Relations Office.

Many students TNM spoke to believe that the varsity took such an action after pressure exerted by right wing groups. On April 28, a social media handle of Pragya Matth Publications had put up an Instagram post with a caption as follows: “In Tamil Nadu, the ‘tukde tukde’ gang is spreading very fast under the shadow of the DMK. It is possible to openly call a great Prime Minister a ‘terrorist’ and survive because this is the tenure of a great PM like Modi. If it was Indira Gandhi in power, this (Tamil Nadu) government would have bit the dust by now, and Stalin would have been in jail.” The post also claims that the Tamil Nadu university has “become the biggest base of the ‘tukde tukde’ gang”.

On the same day, the founder of the Pragya Matth Publications had posted the same photo on Twitter and tagged Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and Minister Kiren Rijju, asking if this was a protest or sedition. The tweet was retweeted by Dr Anand Patil, who is a professor at the university’s Hindi department.

Earlier in 2020, during the nationwide protests against the Union government’s passing of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, six students who burnt the effigy of Modi had been expelled from the university hostel. The management, however, later revoked the order with strict instructions. “Don't be involved in activities like protests. Children are here to study. We cannot encourage congregation other than for academic activities,” the instructions read.

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