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Mamata out to muzzle campuses?

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A gathering protests the Trinamool government’s ban on rallies at College Square, central Kolkata, on June 10. The protest is ongoing

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Coming close on the heels of the College Square rally ban, the new student election rules promulgated by the state government have raised the hackles of many citizens

By Sucheta Dasgupta

Student politics has traditionally been the first stepping stone to legislature for most politicians worth their salt in the state of West Bengal.

Last week, the Mamata Banerjee government framed rules under the West Bengal Universities and Colleges (Administration and Regulation) Act 2017, purportedly to depoliticise campuses. They are yet to be notified but are sure to raise the hackles of many an activist or even neutral-minded citizens.

Students will henceforth be barred from contesting elections on political parties’ symbols. The student union will be replaced by the student council of which the president and the vice-president will be teachers nominated by the vice-chancellor. The treasurer who will control the flow of funds will also be a teacher. Elections will be held only for the post of class representative, once every two years.  The general secretary will be a student elected by all the class representatives in the first meeting of the council.

There are additional stipulations—candidates must have at least 60 percent attendance, no criminal record, reasonably good academic performance and, once elected, cannot serve more than two terms.

The rules are set to become effective in the 2018 campus elections in the state.

The new regulations, however, seem to have arrived at a time when totalitarianism by governments is slowly gaining ground all over the country. For instance, in Telangana’s Hyderabad, the public relations officer of Osmania University, a hotbed of pro-beef agitations and Dalit protests, has also last week issued a note proscribing all political activity, including public meetings, on campus.

And in April, the Jawaharlal Nehru University— following a recent University Grants Commission’s notification—announced a massive reduction in student intake for its MPhil and PhD courses for the upcoming academic session, seen by many quarters as punishment by the centre for its 2016 stir that followed the arrest of JNU Students’ Union president from AISF and PhD scholar Kanhaiya Kumar.

Which begs the question, are ruling parties and their unions finding themselves on the back foot on these campuses, at least as far as electoral politics is concerned?

Trinamool Congress’ students union TMCP has slowly managed to gather influence in educational institutions across the state but so far it has failed to manage a breakthrough in the prestigious and politically significant Presidency College and Jadavpur University.  Here the main forces are still the SFI, the students’ wing of the CPM, and, in case of Presidency, the Independent Consolidation, a coalition of anti-SFI forces like Chhatra Parishad (Congress), Naxalites, SUCI and DSO.

The IC won the student elections this year with SFI presenting it with a tough fight. In JU, the SFI made a comeback in the arts faculty while TMCP lost the polls to all five office-bearers’ posts.

So these steps, which many might call undemocratic, might well be a plan to muzzle campus politics, coming as they do on the heels of the June 1 rally ban at historic College Square, College Street, in central Kolkata—which is witness to the freedom struggle, the Naxalite uprisings and even the popular movement that brought Banerjee herself to power and has been the protest hub of Kolkata since the 19th century. The ostensible trigger for the ban was a student’s putative complaint to the CM that they found it hard to study amid the noise generated by the protests in the area.

Interestingly, a group of individuals led by theatre artistes Joyraj Bhattacharjee and Shreyasi Bhaduri and poet and academic Nandini Dhar, picking lampoon and hyperbole as their weapons of choice, have been holding a silent protest at the very spot for over a week now. As participants do little more than loiter or sit in the area, wearing strips of black cloth covering their mouths, reading, holding placards and making street art, police have no ground to arrest them and, though present in strength, can only stand and stare.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

2024 Lok Sabha Elections

Amit Shah says there will be jungle raj in the country if INDIA Bloc is voted to power

The Union Home Minister asserted that, if INDIA Bloc alliance comes to power, there will be a complete jungle raj in the country as well as in Bihar.

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Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Monday that there will be jungle raj in the country if INDIA bloc partners – Congress and RJD – are voted to power. He was addressing an election rally in favour of senior BJP leader and Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai, in Bihar’s Samastipur district where he said that the latest recovery of Rs 30 crore and more from the house of a minister in Jharkhand proves INDIA bloc alliance leaders are corrupt.

The Union Home Minister asserted that, if INDIA Bloc alliance comes to power, there will be a complete jungle raj in the country as well as in Bihar. Earlier the Enforcement Directorate on Monday recovered a huge amount of unaccounted cash during searches at the premises of a domestic help who was allegedly linked to the secretary of Jharkhand minister Alamgir Alam.

Shah asked the people at the rally that who will be the prime minister of the INDIA bloc? He asked if Sharad Pawar  would become the prime minister? Or Will Mamata Banerjee will become the PM of the country or MK Stalin or Uddhav Thackeray? He jokingly took at dig at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and said that he would like to take another name. He asked the people not to laugh and said can Rahul baba become the PM?

Shah accused the leaders of the RJD and the Congress of not attending the Ayodhya Ram temple Pran Pratishtha because of vote bank politics.  He further added that RJD’s Lalu Prasad and Congress always opposed the construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya. Shah pointed out that Congress has always opposed reservation for the backward classes. Sarairanjan block comes under the Ujiarpur Lok Sabha constituency where Rai is seeking a reelection. Rai, who is the NDA nominee, is up against RJD’s Alok Mehta.

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2024 Lok Sabha Elections

Union Minister Anurag Thakur lashes out at Congress, accuses party of receiving support from Pakistan

Anurag Thakur was speaking to the media during an event in Himachal Pradesh’s Una district

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Union Minister Anurag Thakur on Monday alleged the influence of foreign powers in the Congress manifesto and accused the grand old party of receiving support from Pakistan. He said the BJP never believes in politics in times of disaster and emergencies, but the Congress has stooped so low that it is doing politics in such matters as well.

Anurag Thakur was speaking to the media during an event in Himachal Pradesh’s Una district on Monday. He also applauded Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government for its proactive role during disastrous floods and rains in Himachal Pradesh. The Union Minister said that the Modi government has distributed crores of rupees in Himachal Pradesh during the disaster.

Thakur took a dig at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and said that the Wayanad MP forgot to follow his own slogan of daro mat. He said that Gandhi is running from one seat to another while fearing defeat in the ongoing Loksabha elections. Thakur further added that Rahul Gandhi first ran from Amethi to Wayanad and now he is contesting from Rae Bareli and the Congress will be wiped out from Rae Bareli as well.

Anurag Thakur targeted the Congress and said the grand old party is living in fool’s paradise of winning the elections on false promises. The Union Minister claimed that the Congress’s dreams will be shattered on June 4 after the election result announcement.

Anurag Thakur is contesting Lok Sabha elections 2024 from Hamirpur seat. He said he was confident that BJP will win the election this time as well. He claimed of having support of the people of the constituency. He also said that his victory margin this time would be more than the previous margin of about 4 lakh votes. Thakur who is a 4 time MP also expressed optimism that the BJP-led NDA will win more than 400 seats in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections.

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2024 Lok Sabha Elections

Rahul Gandhi challenges PM Modi to lift 50% cap on reservation

Rahul Gandhi today addressed a rally at Ratlam in Madhya Pradesh, where he said this election is being fought to save the Constitution.

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Congress leader Rahul Gandhi announced today that the party would raise quota benefits for members of Dalit, backward, and tribal communities and lift the 50% restriction on caste-based quotas imposed by the Supreme Court.

Speaking at a election campaign in Ratlam, Madhya Pradesh, Gandhi said, the Constitution is being defended in this election. “BJP and RSS wish to bring this to a close and alter it. And this is being saved by the Congress and the INDIA bloc. You have rights on jal (water), jangal (forest), and zameen (land) under this Constitution. With a copy of the Constitution in his hand, he declared, “Narendra Modi wants to get rid of them and have total power.

He claimed that if the BJP won, its leaders would change the Constitution. They used the slogan 400 seats for this reason. However, they won’t be getting 150 seats; forget about 400, he added. They promise to eliminate reservations. He would like to inform that going forward, they will surpass the 50% reservation cap. Congress will reserve as much space as is necessary for the underprivileged, the backward, Dalits, and Adivasis, he said.

Gandhi’s comments come with a heated campaign for the Lok Sabha elections and contentious discussions about reservations between the NDA and the INDIA alliance.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP has claimed that the Congress intends to modify the backward class reservation in order to benefit Muslims. The claims have been refuted by the Congress. At a rally in Gujarat, Banaskantha, the PM said, he challenges the shehzada of the Congress as well as his party and its supporters to announce they will never misuse reservation in the name of religion, nor will they play with the Constitution or grant reservation in the name of religion.

Gandhi claimed during the Ratlam rally that stories about crimes against Adivasis are not covered by the media. The media does not report on the rape of your children or the seizure of your land. These media companies do not employ Adivasis, he said.

Meanwhile, Ratlam will vote in the fourth phase of the Lok Sabha election on May 13. Former MP and former Union Minister Kantilal Bhuria has been named by the Congress for Ratlam seat. The BJP’s choice from the seat they won in the 2019 election is Anita Nagar Singh Chauhan.

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