According to a notification uploaded on the board’s website, the 50 supernumerary seats shall be distributed strictly based on the NEET-UG merit of the candidates concerned and their preferences among the seven newly established government medical colleges. The U-turn came after weeks of national outrage when the board had r said it cannot conduct fresh counselling for MBBS admissions and that the allocation of supernumerary seats to those who were admitted to the SMVDIME should be decided at the government level.

This sudden clarification came in a letter to the Union Territory’s health and medical education department, which sought its intervention in the relocation of students of the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Institute of Medical Excellence (SMVDIME).

Now, the Jammu and Kashmir Board of Professional Entrance Examination (BOPEE) said it will  conduct fresh counselling for the 2025-26 session for the medical students of Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Institute of Medical Excellence (SMVDIME). Students have now been called for their counselling tomorrow, Saturday January 24 reports The Hindistan Times and Indian Express. This is for allotment of colleges across the Valley and Jammu.

The students, it is reported, would now be adjusted in seven government medical colleges of the union territory – three in the Kashmir valley and four in the  province of Jammu. While 22 seats are available spread across Kashmir colleges, 28 students will be adjusted in Jammu.

The National Medical Commission (NMC) had earlier this month withdrawn the permission it had earlier granted to SMVDIME to conduct an MBBS course in the current academic year. This has left 50 MBBS students who joined the institute without a college. Ironically, the NMC had cited deficiencies in college infrastructure and operations; however, the much criticised decision had come in the wake of far right-wing groups protesting against the course’s demography – of the 50 students, 44 were Muslim, and most were from Kashmir.

“That the Board shall conduct the physical round of counselling to accommodate MBBS students of SMVDIME Katra to the Govt. Medical Colleges within the UT of J&K against the supernumerary seats so created,” the BOPEE has now said in a fresh notification.

The notification said that the Health and Medical Education department has conveyed the seat matrix of the 50 supernumerary seats. As per the matrix, seven additional seats each have been allotted in four government medical colleges in Jammu province – GMC Udhampur, GMC Kathua, GMC Rajouri and GMC Doda – while seven additional seats each have been allotted in GMC Baramulla and GMC Handwara. Eight have been allotted in GMC Anantnag. Incidentally, the seven government medical colleges that have been allotted the supernumerary seats have been set up only in the past seven years. The government has not allotted any supernumerary seats in premier institutes like GMC Srinagar, GMC Jammu or the SKIMS Medical College.

Previously, in a communication to the J-K’s Health and Medical Education department dated January 21, BOPEE had said it cannot conduct fresh counselling for the 2025-26 session, and asked the J-K government to admit students to supernumerary seats in other medical colleges “at its own level”. “The creation and allotment of supernumerary seats doesn’t fall within the ambit of BOPEE,” the communication said. The change of stand came within hours. In fact, both communications are dated January 21.

Related:

Partitioned minds, a Saffron Fatwa & Denial of Fair Opportunity: Mata Vaishno Devi University, Jammu

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Why the agitation at all? Because. Because. How can Muslim students –that too 42 of the 50 admissions!–study in a college bearing this name! On streets, within official corridors, the voices were shrill and focussed, cancel these admissions, No Muslims in this “Holy Medical College!” they said.

A strident and crude local unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) joined in as part of a neatly scripted plan, visible, vocal and crass pitching its demand to snatch away legitimately procured admission and ensure that ‘only Hindus’ study in that medical college since the Jammu-based medical institute funded by Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board! The BJP also sought the L-G’s intervention to reserve all the seats at the varsity for Hindus because “it has come up over donations of Hindu devotees”. Only seven Hindus had made it past the test in a batch of 50. The fact that this august institution, had also been funded by public money from the state exchequer, Rs 24 crores last year and Rs 28 crores this year was immaterial to the protestors drunk on prejudice and power.

The agitation that had been launched in late November 2025–as visible on the streets as on social media was backed by the Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha— who responded, we are reportedly told—and ensured that the “National Medical Commission” issued a saffron fatwa to the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Institute of Medical Excellence (SMVDIME). Following a hasty inspection carried out on site four days prior (around January 4), orders were given to “shut down” the MBBS Course for which, after due process, permission had been granted four months ago.On January 6, 2026, the NMC’s Medical Assessment and Rating Board withdrew the Letter of Permission granted to the varsity for running the MBBS course with 50 seats for the academic year 2025-26. No show-cause notice was given to the college, there is no room for appeal or due process.

Do we not believe in instant (in) justice in this version of a Hindu rashtra?

The turnaround intervention by the NMC, guided, is not only a tale of gross violation of fundamental rights of equality and non-discrimination enshrined in the Constitution. Worse or as bad is how openly credits were distributed by the victorious. The Hindu reported on January 7, how members of the Sangarsh Samiti in Jammu distributed sweets and played loud music to celebrate the “victory” of their agitation, which began on November 22, 2025 precisely.  These images were played out on the ever visible and intrusive social media too. “We have come to celebrate the victory of our agitation. We especially thank the Union Home Minister and Health Minister for respecting our sentiments. We believe the decision took longer because of the legal process. We also thank the prominent personalities who joined us in our protests,” convener of the Sangarsh Samiti Sukhvir Mankotia is reported to have said.

Moreover, what does this means for the region? Kashmir, Ladhakh and Jammu have seen and witnessed multiple levels and layers of betrayals by the Indian state and officialdom. This latest is, above all else, an abdication of this government’s own hollow promises and rhetoric that it has used since the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019. Any efforts at return to participative, representative rights-based citizenship by Kashmiris is thwarted by a prejudiced and exclusivist governance by the centre’s representatives and other institutions influenced by the Centre. This augurs ill on principle and also in terms of the social peace of the state and region given the overall fragility of the Valley and Jammu.

Alienation has been the tale that most Kashmiris grow up with, real, not imagined. When 42 students pass a gruelling NEET test for the MBBS Course and are told –after they are horrifyingly witness to crude slogans of protests and shoddy dances of victory in the streets–that they cannot exercise their Right to Education (now a fundamental right under article 21a of the Constitution) because of the colour of their faith, and because they are Kashmiris, it is not only alienation that they will once again have been forced to feel. There will be anger too.

Today the NMC justifies its unjustifiable step citing ‘shortage of teachers/tutors, lecture theatres and library resources’, unconvincing as an argument as all these facilities had been scrutinized and passed when permission was obtained four months ago. Key to the inevitable fallout out is whether out of any last grain of shame, the SMVDIME will appeal the NMC’s unjust scrapping of its MBBS permission in court and fight on constitutional principle. If this college succumbs, as have others to the might of a majoritarian agenda, we can again say with bitter conviction that India is now almost completely deep down into an abyss of its own making!

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When the state turns rogue even protests dry up, Salutes & Apologies Professor Saibaba!

The post Partitioned minds, a Saffron Fatwa & Denial of Fair Opportunity: Mata Vaishno Devi University, Jammu appeared first on SabrangIndia.

On January 3, 1831, 176 years ago Savitribai Phule, arguably India’s first woman teacher and forgotten liberator was born. With the first school for girls from different castes that she set up in Bhidewada, Pune (the seat of Brahmanism) Krantijyoti Savitribai as she is reverentially known, by the Indian Bahujan movement, blazed a revolutionary trial. There have been consistent demands to observe January 3 as Teachers Day. Without her, Indian women would not have had the benefits of education.

To mark the memory of this remarkable woman we bring to you her letters to life partner Jyotiba. Jyotiba and Savitribai were Comrades in Arms in their struggle against the emancipation of India’s disenfranchised people.

Translated from the Original Marathi with an introduction Sunil Sardar Reproduced here are the English translation of three important Letters – (originally in Marathi and published in MG Mali’s edition of her collected works, Savitribai Phule Samagra Wangmaya) – that Savitribai wrote to her husband Jyotiba in a span of 20 years.

The letters are significant as they write of the wider concerns that drove this couple, the emancipation of the most deprived segments of society and the struggle to attain for them, full human dignity and freedom.

This vision for a new and liberated society – free from ignorance, bigotry, deprivation, and hunger – was the thread that bonded the couple, arching from the private to the personal.

Theirs was a relationship of deep and shared concerns, each providing strength to the other. When large sections of 19^th century Maharashtrian society was ranged against Phule’s reconstructive radicalism, it was the unfailing and shared vision and dedication of his life partner that needs have been emotionally sustaining.  In our tribute to this couple and the tradition of radical questioning that they harboured, we bring to our readers these letters.

1856. The first letter, written in 1856, speaks about the core issue: education and its transformative possibilities in a society where learning, had for centuries been the monopoly of the Brahmins; who, in turn, used this exclusive privilege to enclave, demoralize and oppress. Away at her parental home to recuperate from an illness, Savitri describes in the letter a conversation with her brother, who is uncomfortable with the couple’s radicalism.

October 1856
The Embodiment of Truth, My Lord Jyotiba,
Savitri salutes you!

After so many vicissitudes, now it seems my health has been fully restored. My brother worked so hard and nursed me so well through my sickness. His service and devotion shows how loving he really is! I will come to Pune as soon as I get perfectly well. Please do not worry about me. I know my absence causes Fatima so much trouble but I am sure she will understand and won’t grumble.

As we were talking one day, my brother said, “You and your husband have rightly been excommunicated because both of you serve the untouchables (Mahars and Mangs). The untouchables are fallen people and by helping them you are bringing a bad name to our family. That is why, I tell you to behave according to the customs of our caste and obey the dictates of the Brahmans.” Mother was so disturbed by this brash talk of my brother.

Though my brother is a good soul he is extremely narrow-minded and so he did not hesitate to bitterly criticize and reproach us. My mother did not reprimand him but tried instead to bring him to his senses, “God has given you a beautiful tongue but it is no good to misuse it so!” I defended our social work and tried to dispel his misgivings. I told him, “Brother, your mind is narrow, and the Brahmans’ teaching has made it worse. Animals like goats and cows are not untouchable for you, you lovingly touch them. You catch poisonous snakes on the day of the snake-festival and feed them milk. But you consider Mahars and Mangs, who are as human as you and I, untouchables. Can you give me any reason for this? When the Brahmans perform their religious duties in their holy clothes, they consider you also impure and untouchable, they are afraid that your touch will pollute them. They don’t treat you differently than the Mahars.” When my brother heard this, he turned red in the face, but then he asked me, “Why do you teach those Mahars and Mangs? People abuse you because you teach the untouchables. I cannot bear it when people abuse and create trouble for you for doing that. I cannot tolerate such insults.” I told him what the (teaching of) English had been doing for the people. I said, “The lack of learning is nothing but gross bestiality. It is through the acquisition of knowledge that (he) loses his lower status and achieves the higher one. My husband is a god-like man. He is beyond comparison in this world, nobody can equal him. He thinks the Untouchables must learn and attain freedom. He confronts the Brahmans and fights with them to ensure Teaching and Learning for the Untouchables because he believes that they are human beings like other and they should live as dignified humans. For this they must be educated. I also teach them for the same reason. What is wrong with that? Yes, we both teach girls, women, Mangs and Mahars. The Brahmans are upset because they believe this will create problems for them. That is why they oppose us and chant the mantra that it is against our religion. They revile and castigate us and poison the minds of even good people like you.

“You surely remember that the British Government had organised a function to honour my husband for his great work. His felicitation caused these vile people much heartburn. Let me tell you that my husband does not merely invoke God’s name and participate in pilgrimages like you. He is actually doing God’s own work. And I assist him in that. I enjoy doing this work. I get immeasurable joy by doing such service. Moreover, it also shows the heights and horizons to which a human being can reach out.”

Mother and brother were listening to me intently. My brother finally came around, repented for what he had said and asked for forgiveness. Mother said, “Savitri, your tongue must be speaking God’s own words. We are blessed by your words of wisdom.” Such appreciation from my mother and brother gladdened my heart. From this you can imagine that there are many idiots here, as in Pune, who poison people’s minds and spread canards against us. But why should we fear them and leave this noble cause that we have undertaken? It would be better to engage with the work instead. We shall overcome and success will be ours in the future. The future belongs to us.

What more could I write?

With humble regards,

Yours,

Savitri

The Poetess in Savitribai

The year 1854 was important as Savitribai published her collection of poems, called Kabya Phule (Poetry’s Blossoms).
Bavan Kashi Subodh Ratnakar (The Ocean of Pure Gems), another collection of what has come to be highly regarded in the world of Marathi poetry was published in 1891. (The Phules had developed a devastating critique of the Brahman interpretation of Marathi history in the ancient and medieval periods. He portrayed the Peshwa rulers, later overthrown by the British, as decadent and oppressive, and Savitribai reiterates those themes in her biography.)
Apart from these two collections, four of Jyotiba’s speeches on Indian History were edited for publication by Savitribai. A few of her own speeches were also published in 1892. Savitribai’s correspondence is also remarkable because they give us an insight into her own life and into the life and lived experiences of women of the time.

1868. The Second letter is about a great social taboo – a love affair between a Brahman boy and an Untouchable girl; the cruel behavior of the ‘enraged’ villagers and how Savitribai stepped in. This intervention saves the lives of the lovers and she sends them away to the safety and caring support of her husband, Jyotiba. With the malevolent reality of honour killings in the India of 2016 and the hate-driven propaganda around ‘love jehad’ this letter is ever so relevant today.

29 August 1868
Naigaon, Peta Khandala
Satara
The Embodiment of Truth, My Lord Jotiba,
Savitri salutes you!
I received your letter. We are fine here. I will come by the fifth of next month. Do not worry on this count. Meanwhile, a strange thing happened here. The story goes like this. One Ganesh, a Brahman, would go around villages, performing religious rites and telling people their fortunes. This was his bread and butter. Ganesh and a teenage girl named Sharja who is from the Mahar (untouchable) community fell in love. She was six months pregnant when people came to know about this affair. The enraged people caught them, and paraded them through the village, threatening to bump them off.

I came to know about their murderous plan. I rushed to the spot and scared them away, pointing out the grave consequences of killing the lovers under the British law. They changed their mind after listening to me.

Sadubhau angrily said that the wily Brahman boy and the untouchable girl should leave the village. Both the victims agreed to this. My intervention saved the couple who gratefully fell at my feet and started crying. Somehow I consoled and pacified them. Now I am sending both of them to you. What else to write?
Yours
Savitri

1877. The last letter, written in 1877, is a heart-rending account of a famine that devastated western Maharashtra. People and animals were dying. Savitri and other Satyashodhak volunteers were doing their best to help. The letter brings out an intrepid Savitri leading a team of dedicated Satyashodhaks striving to overcome a further exacerbation of the tragedy by moneylenders’ trying to benefit.  She meets the local District administration. The letter ends on a poignant note where Savitribai reiterates her total commitment to her the humanitarian work pioneered by the Phules.

20 April, 1877
Otur, Junner
The Embodiment of Truth, My Lord Jyotiba,
Savitri salutes you!
The year 1876 has gone, but the famine has not – it stays in most horrendous forms here. The people are dying. The animals are dying, falling on the ground. There is severe scarcity of food. No fodder for animals. The people are forced to leave their villages. Some are selling their children, their young girls, and leaving the villages. Rivers, brooks and tanks have completely dried up – no water to drink. Trees are dying – no leaves on trees. Barren land is cracked everywhere. The sun is scorching – blistering. The people crying for food and water are falling on the ground to die. Some are eating poisonous fruits, and drinking their own urine to quench their thirst. They cry for food and drink, and then they die.

Our Satyashodhak volunteers have formed committees to provide food and other life-saving material to the people in need. They have formed relief squads.
Brother Kondaj and his wife Umabai are taking good care of me. Otur’s Shastri, Ganapati Sakharan, Dumbare Patil, and others are planning to visit you. It would be better if you come from Satara to Otur and then go to Ahmednagar.

You may remember R.B. Krishnaji Pant and Laxman Shastri. They travelled with me to the affected area and gave some monetary help to the victims.

The moneylenders are viciously exploiting the situation. Bad things are taking place as a result of this famine. Riots are breaking out. The Collector heard of this and came to ease the situation. He deployed the white police officers, and tried to bring the situation under control. Fifty Satyasholdhaks were rounded up. The Collector invited me for a talk. I asked the Collector why the good volunteers had been framed with false charges and arrested without any rhyme or reason. I asked him to release them immediately. The Collector was quite decent and unbiased. He shouted at the white soldiers, “Do the Patil farmers rob? Set them free.” The Collector was moved by the people’s plights. He immediately sent four bullock cartloads of (jowar) food.

You have started the benevolent and welfare work for the poor and the needy. I also want to carry my share of the responsibility. I assure you I will always help you. I wish the godly work will be helped by more people.

I do not want to write more.
Yours,
Savitri

(These letters have been excerpted with grateful thanks from A Forgotten Liberator, The Life and Struggle of Savitrabai Phule, Edited by Braj Ranjan Mani, Pamela Sardar)

Bibliography:

Krantijyoti : Revolutionary flame
Brahmans: Priestly “upper” caste with a powerful hold on all fairs of society and state including access to education, resources and mobility (spelt interchangeably as Brahmins)
Mahars:The Mahar is an Indian Caste, found largely in the state of Maharashtra, where they compromise 10% of the population, and neighboring areas. Most of the Mahar community followed social reformer B. R. Ambedkar in converting to Buddhism in the middle of the 20th century.
Mangs: The Mang (or Matang -Minimadig in Gujarat and Rajasthan) community is an Indian caste historically associated with low-status or ritually impure professions such as village musicians, cattle castraters, leather curers, midwives, hangmen, undertakers. Today they are listed as a Scheduled Castes a term which has replaced the former the derogatory ‘Untouchable’
Satyashodhak Samaj:  A society established by Jyotirao Phule on September 24, 1873. This was started as a group whose main aim was to liberate the shudra and untouchable castes from exploitation and oppression
Shudra: The fourth caste under the rigid caste Hindu system; these were further made more rigid in the Manu Smruti
Ati Shudra: Most of the groups listed under this category come under the untouchables who were used for the most venal tasks in caste ridden Hindu society but not treated as part of the caste system.
Jowar: The Indian name for sorghum

How the Education for girls was pioneered

The Phule couple decided to start schools for girls, especially from the shudra and atishudra castes but also including others so that social cohesion of sorts could be attempted in the classroom. Bhidewada in Pune was the chosen site, a bank stands there today. There is a movement among Bahujans to reclaim this historic building. When the Phules faced stiff resistance and a boycott, a Pune-based businessman Usman Shaikh gave them shelter. Fatima Shaikh Usman’s sister was the first teacher colleague of Savitribai and the two trained teachers who ran the school. The school started with nine girl students in 1848.

Sadashiv Govande contributed books from Ahmednagar. It functioned for about six months and then had to be closed down. Another building was found and the school reopened a few months later. The young couple faced severe opposition from almost all sections. Savitribai was subject to intense harassment everyday as she walked to school. Stones, mud and dirt were flung at her as she passed. She was often abused by groups of men with orthodox beliefs who opposed the education for women. Filth including cow dung was flung on her. Phule gave her hope, love and encouragement. She went to school wearing an old sari, and carried an extra sari with her to change into after she reached the school. The sheer daring and doggedness of the couple and their comrades in arms broke the resistance. Finally, the pressure on her eased when she was compelled to slap one of her tormentors on the street!

Once the caste Hindu Brahmanical hierarchy who were the main opponents of female education realized that the Phule couple would not easily give in, they arm-twisted Jyotiba’s father. Intense pressure was brought by the Brahmins on Phule’s father, Govindrao, to convince him that his son was on the wrong track, that what he was doing was against the Dharma. Finally, things came to a head when Phule’s father told him to leave home in 1849. Savitri preferred to stay by her husband’s side, braving the opposition and difficulties, and encouraging Phule to continue their educational work.

However, their pioneering move had won some support. Necessities like books were supplied through well wishers; a bigger house, owned by a Muslim, was found for a second school which was started in 1851. Moro Vithal Walvekar and Deorao Thosar assisted the school. Major Candy, an educationalist of Pune, sent books. Jyotirao worked here without any salary and later Savitribai was put in charge. The school committee, in a report, noted, “The state of the school funds has compelled the committee to appoint teachers on small salaries, who soon give up when they find better appointment…Savitribai, the school headmistress, has nobly volunteered to devote herself to the improvement of female education without remuneration. We hope that as knowledge advances, the people of this country will be awakened to the advantages of female education and will cordially assist in all such plans calculated to improve the conditions of those girls.”

On November 16, 1852, the education department of the government organised a public felicitation of the Phule couple, where they were honoured with shawls.
On February 12, 1853, the school was publicly examined. The report of the event state: “The prejudice against teaching girls to read and write began to give way…the good conduct and honesty of the peons in conveying the girls to and from school and parental treatment and indulgent attention of the teachers made the girls love the schools and literally run to them with alacrity and joy.”

A Dalit student of Savitribai, Muktabai, wrote a remarkable essay which was published in the paper Dyanodaya, in the year 1855. In her essay, Muktabai poignantly describes the wretchedness of the so-called untouchables and severely criticizes the Brahmanical religion for degrading and dehumanizing her people.

The post Love-Letters like no other appeared first on SabrangIndia.

On October 28, the Modi-led BJP government attempted, much like Lord Curzon during colonial rule, to muzzle the democratic and federal character of Panjab University by dissolving its Senate. Under the Panjab University Act of 1947, the Senate is the highest democratic body of the university, responsible for its management, property, and governance. It consists of 91 members—47 elected, 36 nominated by the Chancellor, 2 from the Punjab Vidhan Sabha, and 6 ex-officio members. Punjab has direct representation through 15 graduate seats, with graduates eligible both to vote and contest elections. The Senate functions as the “parliament” of the university, while the Syndicate, its executive body, is elected from among Senate members.

Ironically, in 1904, Lord Curzon had introduced amendments to the Punjab University Act precisely to curb anti-colonial sentiment by weakening the Senate and increasing imperial control. Today, the Modi government appears to be following a similar path—seeking to abolish the Senate to undermine Punjab’s historical claim over Panjab University, erode its autonomy, centralise control, and pave the way for privatisation. However, the historic and organic movement led by students and supported by broader democratic forces shattered the BJP–RSS dream of turning Chandigarh into a “small Nagpur”.

The dissolution of the Senate sent a clear message: Panjab University was being taken away from Punjab, its democracy murdered, and its autonomy destroyed. This sparked widespread outrage across Punjab. Even opportunist electoral parties—many of which had previously betrayed people’s struggles—were compelled to join the protest. Conscious sections of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, and other regions also recognised this as an attack on autonomy and democratic institutions and extended their support.

The Panjab University struggle has once again highlighted the urgency of addressing unresolved questions of federalism—particularly Punjab’s claim over Panjab University and Chandigarh, issues of river water sharing, other federal rights, and the systematic daylight assassination of democracy.

At its core, neoliberal policy directly undermines federalism by centralising power to facilitate large-scale privatisation. International institutions such as the IMF, World Bank, and WTO actively promote this centralisation to enable the exploitation of resources and labour. Thus, the erosion of federalism and democracy is not accidental but structural to the neoliberal project.

Indian rulers have historically preferred a highly centralised state rather than a genuinely federal one. During the anti-colonial struggle, the Indian National Congress promised linguistic federalism. However, after Independence, the Nehru–Patel–Sitaramayya (JVP) Committee rejected the Dhar Commission’s recommendations, arguing that state formation on linguistic lines would threaten “national unity”. In reality, greater state autonomy was seen as an obstacle to imperialist exploitation. Hence, a “strong Centre” was prioritised over true federalism.

Although popular struggles eventually forced the government to create linguistic states, this process lacked a sincere federal spirit. Punjab faced particularly harsh discrimination. After a prolonged struggle, the Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966 created a truncated Punjab, carving away Punjabi-speaking areas, undermining Punjab’s river-water rights, and snatching Chandigarh—constructed by demolishing more than 28 Punjabi Puadhi villages. The three-language formula was imposed, and the religious and cultural demands of Sikh minorities were ignored.

Sections 72, 78, 79, 81, 84, and 87 of the same Act placed Panjab University, Punjab Agricultural University, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, the Bhakra Beas Management Board, and Chandigarh under central control. Despite widespread protests, betrayal continued. Although the Rajiv–Longowal Accord promised Chandigarh to Punjab in 1986, the Centre reneged. Central control over the BBMB, the increased presence of the BSF, and the appointment of a centrally controlled administrator in Chandigarh continue to erode Punjab’s federal rights.

The assault on federalism intensified with the 42nd Constitutional Amendment in 1976, which transferred key subjects like education, forests, and minerals from the State List to the Concurrent List. The neoliberal reforms of the 1990s further weakened states’ political and financial autonomy. With GST, states have been reduced to little more than municipalities, facing centralised revenue collection, decentralised expenditure responsibilities, and constant administrative interference.

Under the BJP–Sangh’s Hindi–Hindu–Hindutva project—embodied in slogans like “one nation, one language,” “one nation, one tax,” “one nation, one election,” and “one nation, one education policy”—the fascist bulldozer has moved from vote theft to Senate theft. When the Centre attempted to snatch Panjab University, the people rose up and forced Modi to retreat once again.

The struggle also firmly rejected attempts to pit Punjab against Haryana. Protesters consistently emphasised that the Centre deliberately foments inter-state conflicts to push privatisation and allow corporate plunder of natural resources across Ladakh, Himachal, Kashmir, Manipur, and central India. This is not the time for people to fight among themselves; the real struggle is against a centralised state serving imperialist interests.

The dissolution of the Senate was carried out under the NEP 2020, which explicitly eliminates elected Senates, student unions, and teacher unions, replacing them with nominated bodies. Universities are being forced to raise fees, rely on loans instead of grants, generate profits, and submit to centrally imposed curricula and regulations. This is the BJP’s idea of “federalism”.

While the Centre strangles federalism, state governments and political parties have largely failed to resist. The Bhagwant Mann-led Punjab government neither provides adequate funding to Panjab University nor actively participates in Senate meetings. Universities across Punjab face acute financial crises, student and Senate elections are avoided, and the NEP 2020 is implemented without resistance.

Ultimately, no mainstream political party appears genuinely committed to federalism. History shows that the struggle for true federalism cannot be led to its logical conclusion by opportunist electoral forces. It must be led by the people themselves—by workers and peasants—through the uprooting of parasitic neoliberal imperialist policies.

Today, as centralisation and privatisation obstruct the development of emerging nationalities from Kashmir to the North-East and push Centre–State relations to a dead end, there is an urgent need for a united national struggle of working people for true federalism. Such federalism is impossible without complete democratisation of society, including the uprooting of feudalism and imperialism. The historic struggle at Panjab University can become a powerful starting point.

Sandeep Kumar PhD, Panjab University, Chandigarh, Member, Panjab University Bachao Morcha

Courtesy: Counter Currents

The post Historic Victory at Panjab University, but Federalism Remains at Stake appeared first on SabrangIndia.

On Friday December 12, 2025, the Union Cabinet cleared HECI Bill under changed name the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhikshan (VBSA) Bill 2025. The Bill has been tabled in the Winter Session. The press conference of over two dozen organisations including the All India Forum for the Right to Education (AIFRTE) has demanded that the Bill, which will redefine Government’s commitment towards public funded higher education and therefore, its purpose, is referred to the Standing Committee for wider consultation.

Reminding the public that the VBSA Bill 2025 is a revived version of a similar HECI Bill 2018, a draft of which was released in June 2018. The revision is largely around renaming the Commission and Councils under it. The Draft HECI Bill 2018 had received more than a lakh unfavourable responses from concerned citizens, students’ and teachers’ associations, parliamentarians and other stakeholders. The public opposition to the Bill was so strong and vocal that the then-NDA government was forced to shelve it, and let it fade from public memory in these seven years before bringing it back.  The draft VBSA Bill 2025 was released on the portal of Members of Parliament on 14.12.2025. The feedback from the stakeholders on the draft HECI Bill 2018 seems to have been ignored completely. Pointing out that the VBSA Bill 2025 will simultaneously repeal the University Grants Commission (UGC) Act 1956, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) Act, 1987 and National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) Act, 1993. The draft VBSA Bill 2025 was released on the portal of Members of Parliament on 14.12.2025. The feedback from the stakeholders on the draft HECI Bill 2018 seems to have been ignored completely.

Some of the most pressing concerns about the VBSA Bill 2025 are:

1. Delinking of funding and regulation: No Council under the Commission has been set for funding of HEIs. The VBSA Bill is to make the Ministry of Education (MoE) responsible for disbursing grants. This will make the process of grant allocation more bureaucratic, arbitrary, and subject to political considerations. By delinking the function of policy-making from the allocation of financial resources, the proposed Bill will use ‘public funding’ as a reward or punishment for ideological It will also heighten hierarchies between different tiers of institutions (Central and state, general and professional, scientific and technical, research and vocational, metropolitan and rural).

2. Composition of members: The composition of the VBSA Bill 2025 signals a takeover of higher education by the officials of the Central government. 10 out of the 12 members of the Commission are either direct recruits of or nominated “experts” by the Central government. Teachers are reduced to just two in number, which is absolutely unacceptable in a body that is to determine the standards and quality of higher education in the country. Both teacher representatives from state higher education institutions will, by virtue of being ‘nominees’ of the Central government, will also likely be political appointments. The composition of the commission does not also reflect the diversity of the country and gives no representation to marginalised groups like SCs, STs, OBCs, women, transpersons, persons with disabilities, and minorities.

3. Centralised regulatory regime: The regulatory provisions of the Bill — grant of authorisation, graded autonomy, and ordering closure of institutions — will install a heavily centralised regime that will lead to punitive annual audit, wastage of time and resources, greater job insecurity for teachers, massive fee hikes, and This will cause students and their family’s great unrest and anxiety. Finally, the fact that the VBSA Bill will have overriding effect over all previous legislation has serious consequences for the nation’s federal character.

4. Complete disregard for diversity: With regards to the setting of standards for higher education, a ‘one size fits all’ model can never succeed. The diversity of this country, and the fact that higher education is still expanding to various sections and particularly rural sectors of society, demands a regulator that is socially responsive and geared towards social justice. The HECI Bill instead aims at downsizing higher education, and completely ignores questions of equity and access. It threatens the closure of ‘underperforming’ public-funded institutions, which are anyway reeling under decades of policy neglect through lack of infrastructure, faculty and other physical-intellectual

5. Threat to autonomy of institutions and principle of federalism: The VBSA Bill puts an end to the autonomy of institutions of higher education from government control. Every regulation relating to standards made by the Commission has to have the prior approval of the Central government. This not only violates the constitutional character of education as part of the Concurrent list, but also leaves the vast majority of the country’s higher educational landscape – run and aided by state governments – in a political tussle with the ruling party at the Centre. It will also encourage the use of regulations as a means to stifle freedom of speech, thought, and dissenting opinion in higher educational institutions. An atmosphere of forced obedience does not encourage meaningful improvements in society or in the state of knowledge.

6. Heightening the crises caused by NEP 2020: It is being argued that the setting up of the VBSA is in alignment with the vision proposed by NEP 2020. Colleges and universities across the country are currently struggling under the weight of the NEP’s vision – which has skewed syllabi and curricula with diluted content, delayed admissions processes through a compromised common university entrance test (CUET) and left seats unfilled, increased costs of undergraduate education with an extra year of college but zero value addition under the four year programme, contractualized teaching positions through lopsided teaching workload across semesters, slashed public funding through proposals for college mergers and institutional loans from the Higher Education Financing Agency (HEFA), reduced the capacity of the research sector and curtailed research fellowships. Under such circumstances, the introduction of another disastrous reform move through the establishment of HECI will be the last nail in the coffin of Indian higher education.

Post-Independence, the historic purpose of nurturing Higher education through public spending has been to enable progressive social and material transformation that will eventually result in greater Equity between various interest-groups in Society. The Constitution had envisaged education as a public good – a means to ensure dignity and upward mobility to individuals and for strengthening the democracy. Education was seen as domain to be shared by the Centre and States. The VBSA Bill 2025 is a structural change, which will lead to extreme centralisation and commercialisation and privatisation of public funded HEIs as they will be pushed to be self-reliant.

As stakeholders, we appeal that the Bill to be referred to the Standing Committee so that teachers, students, and educationists are given enough opportunity to present their case.

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The post Over-centralisation, Unaccountability, Political Considerations & Control: Stakeholders critique the VBSA 2025 appeared first on SabrangIndia.

This analysis examines both facets of this pivotal judgment.

A case of investigative failure

The case was brought up by Sukdeb Saha after his 17-year-old daughter, Ms. X, died after a fall from her hostel building in Vishakhapatnam, where she was enrolled in a coaching institute. The appellant’s plea to the Supreme Court was precipitated by a series of glaring deficiencies and contradictions in the local police investigation, which led him to lose faith in the state machinery and seek a transfer of the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

The Court documented the investigative lapses, which collectively painted a picture of an inquiry that was, at best, ineffective and, at worst, designed to obscure the truth. Key failures identified by the Court included:

1. The unsubstantiated suicide theory: The police hastily concluded the death was a suicide without a suicide note, psychological history, or corroborating witness statements, a conclusion the Court deemed a “post-facto justification.”
2. Contradictory CCTV evidence: Footage showed a discrepancy in the clothing of the girl seen going to the terrace and the victim found on the ground, a contradiction the police made no effort to reconcile.
3. Misrepresentation of medical state: The police and hospital claimed the victim was unconscious upon admission, but an AIIMS medical board report and eyewitness accounts confirmed she was conscious and responsive, indicating a missed opportunity to record her statement.
4. Conflict of interest: A single medical officer served as the autopsy surgeon, the chemical analyst, and a member of the internal inquiry committee, an “egregious conflict of interest” that compromised the investigation’s integrity.
5. Destruction of forensic evidence: The victim’s viscera were prematurely destroyed by the forensic lab before a court-mandated DNA comparison could be completed, an act that “irrevocably compromised the proceedings.”
6. Withholding key reports: The authorities failed to produce the Chemical Analysis Report and the final opinion on the cause of death, documents of “foundational evidentiary value.”

Based on this litany of failures, the Court concluded that the case met the “compelling necessity” standard required for transferring an investigation. It held that a CBI probe was essential to ensure impartiality, restore public confidence, and deliver justice to the bereaved family.

1.      The Sukdeb Saha Guidelines for Student Well-being

The judgment’s second, and more far-reaching, part transitions from the specific case to the systemic issue of student mental health. The Court framed the rising number of student suicides—over 13,000 in 2022 according to NCRB data—as a “deepening crisis” and a “systemic failure” of an education system that prioritizes relentless competition over holistic well-being.

Drawing a parallel to its intervention in Vishaka v. State of Rajasthan[(1997) 6 SCC 241], where it filled a legislative vacuum on workplace sexual harassment, the Court invoked its powers under Article 141 of the Constitution to issue binding interim guidelines. It grounded these guidelines in the constitutional “Right to Mental Health” as an integral part of the Right to Life under Article 21, as well as India’s international law obligations.

The following 15 guidelines were issued, establishing a preventive and supportive framework applicable to all educational institutions across India until a formal legislative framework is enacted.

The Guidelines

The following are the exhaustive guidelines as laid down by the Supreme Court in the judgment:

1. All educational institutions shall adopt and implement a uniform mental health policy, drawing cues from the UMMEED [Understand, Motivate, Manage, Empathise, Empower, Develop] Draft Guidelines, the MANODARPAN initiative, and the National Suicide Prevention Strategy. This policy shall be reviewed and updated annually and made publicly accessible on institutional websites and notice boards of the institutes.
2. All educational institutions with 100 or more enrolled students shall appoint/engage at least one qualified counsellor, psychologist, or social worker with demonstrable training in child and adolescent mental health. Institutions with fewer students shall establish formal referral linkages with external mental health professionals.

III. All educational institutions shall ensure optimal student-to-counsellor ratios. Dedicated mentors or counsellors shall be assigned to smaller batches of students, especially during examination periods and academic transitions, to provide consistent, informal, and confidential support.

1. All educational institutions, more particularly the coaching institutes/centres, shall, as far as possible, refrain from engaging in batch segregation based on academic performance, public shaming, or assignment of academic targets disproportionate to students’ capacities.
2. All educational institutions shall establish written protocols for immediate referral to mental health services, local hospitals, and suicide prevention helplines. Suicide helpline numbers, including Tele-MANAS and other national services, shall be prominently displayed in hostels, classrooms, common areas, and on websites in large and legible print.
3. All teaching and non-teaching staff shall undergo mandatory training at least twice a year, conducted by certified mental health professionals, on psychological first-aid, identification of warning signs, response to self-harm, and referral mechanisms.

VII. All educational institutions shall ensure that all teaching, non-teaching, and administrative staff are adequately trained to engage with students from vulnerable and marginalised backgrounds in a sensitive, inclusive, and non-discriminatory manner. This shall include, but not be limited to, students belonging to Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), Other Backward Classes (OBC), Economically Weaker Sections (EWS), LGBTQ+ communities, students with disabilities, those in out-of-home care, and students affected by bereavement, trauma, or prior suicide attempts, or intersecting form of marginalisation.

VIII. All educational institutions shall establish robust, confidential, and accessible mechanisms for the reporting, redressal, and prevention of incidents involving sexual assault, harassment, ragging, and bullying on the basis of caste, class, gender, sexual orientation, disability, religion, or ethnicity. Every such institution shall constitute an internal committee or designated authority empowered to take immediate action on complaints and provide psycho-social support to victims. Institutions shall also maintain zero tolerance for retaliatory actions against complainants or whistle-blowers. In all such cases, immediate referral to trained mental health professionals must be ensured, and the student’s safety, physical and psychological, shall be prioritised. Failure to take timely or adequate action in such cases, especially where such neglect contributes to a student’s self-harm or suicide, shall be treated as institutional culpability, making the administration liable to regulatory and legal consequences.

1. All educational Institutions shall regularly organise sensitisation programmes (physical and/or online) for parents and guardians on student mental health. It shall be the duty of the institution to sensitise the parents and guardians to avoid placing undue academic pressure, to recognise signs of psychological distress, and to respond empathetically and supportively. Further, mental health literacy, emotional regulation, life skills education, and awareness of institutional support services shall be integrated into student orientation programmes and co-curricular activities.
2. All educational institutions shall maintain anonymised records and prepare an annual report indicating the number of wellness interventions, student referrals, training sessions, and mental health-related activities. This report shall be submitted to the relevant regulatory authority, which may be the State Education Department, University Grants Commission (UGC), All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), or as otherwise indicated.
3. All educational institutions shall prioritise extracurricular activities, including sports, arts, and personality development initiatives. Examination patterns shall be periodically reviewed to reduce academic burden and to cultivate a broader sense of identity among students beyond test scores and ranks.

XII. All educational institutions, including coaching centres and training institutes, shall provide regular, structured career counselling services for students and their parents or guardians. These sessions shall be conducted by qualified counsellors and shall aim to reduce unrealistic academic pressure, promote awareness of diverse academic and professional pathways, and assist students in making informed and interest-based career decisions. Institutions shall ensure that such counselling is inclusive, sensitive to socio-economic and psychological contexts, and does not reinforce narrow definitions of merit or success.

XIII. All residential-based educational institutions, including hostel owners, wardens and caretakers, shall take proactive steps to ensure that campuses remain free from harassment, bullying, drugs, and other harmful substances, thereby ensuring a safe and healthy living and learning environment for all students.

XIV. All residential-based institutions shall install tamper-proof ceiling fans or equivalent safety devices, and shall restrict access to rooftops, balconies, and other high-risk areas, in order to deter impulsive acts of self-harm.

1. All coaching hubs, including but not limited to Jaipur, Kota, Sikar, Chennai, Hyderabad, Delhi, Mumbai, and other cities where students migrate in large numbers for competitive examination preparation, shall implement heightened mental health protections and preventive measures. These regions, having witnessed disproportionately high incidents of student suicides, require special attention. The concerned authorities, namely, the Department of Education, District Administration, and management of educational institutions, shall ensure the provision of regular career counselling for students and parents, regulation of academic pressure through structured academic planning, availability of continuous psychological support, and the establishment of institutional mechanisms for monitoring and accountability to safeguard student mental well-being.

2.      Enforcement and accountability

To ensure these guidelines are not merely advisory, the Court established a robust, time-bound enforcement and accountability mechanism:

1. State-level action: All States and Union Territories were directed to notify rules for the registration and regulation of private coaching centers within two months, incorporating the mental health safeguards.
2. District-level oversight: A District-Level Monitoring Committee, chaired by the District Magistrate/Collector, should be constituted in every district to oversee implementation, conduct inspections, and handle complaints.
3. Central accountability & judicial supervision: The Union of India was directed to file a compliance affidavit within 90 days. The Supreme Court has retained supervisory jurisdiction, listing the matter for a follow-up hearing on October 27, 2025, to review compliance.

In conclusion, the Sukdeb Saha judgment is a powerful judicial intervention that addresses both an individual plea for justice and a national social crisis. It sets a new precedent for holding institutions accountable for the mental well-being of students and provides a comprehensive, actionable framework to foster safer and more supportive educational environments across India. However, whether this will materialise into effective implementation, that too in the face of powerful coaching and education business lobby across India is yet to be seen.

 (The author is part of the legal research team of the organisation)

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The post How the Supreme Court built a binding legal framework to protect student mental heath appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Talha Mannan (TM), a PhD student in the MANUU (Hyderabad) and the National Secretary of the Students Islamic Organization (SIO, established in 1982; an affiliate of the Jamaat-e-Islami-e-Hind-JIH, established in 1941 by Abul Ala Maududi) has come out with a critique in his piece published by a “Muslim” portal, maktoobmedia, dated August 26, 2025, “How (not) to talk about Aligarh Muslim University”. This was a week after the “second stage” of the hunger strike protest (hunger strike till death) was finally withdrawn in the pre-dawn moments of August 19, 2025.  The “first” was claimed to have been clinched by some girl students a few days earlier than August 19, 2025. Whereas the “third” stage came to an end with another glass of fruit juice offered by some girls (dukhtaraan-e-millat), subsequent to August 19, 2025.

While expressing his discomfiture with Yanis Iqbal’s and with Bhavuk Sharma’s pieces, (besides some of the write-ups of Prof Mohammad Sajjad), Talha Mannan (TM) has made what is termed as Strawman’s arguments. TM is manufacturing contentions out of nowhere and attributing these to the three authors.

For instance TM seems to suggest that a Leftist slogan, lal salam and laal-laal lehrayega) is equivalent to his Islamist slogan “Islam Ki Dawat”. First of all, no such Leftist slogan was raised in the AMU student protests of August 2025. Thus, he creates an illusion for himself that he has triumphantly refuted the arguments of the authors he purports to rebut. Also, how did he arrive at a conclusion that Bhavuk (and his PhD supervisor) are Marxists/Leftists, is also quite unclear? Of course, Yanis Iqbal does claim to be a Marxist, in his Facebook profile. TM’s motives become evident when he criticises the authors on account of failing to oppose the UP government’s ban on Namaz on roads.

As far as I have been able to follow from their publicly iterated positions, around the August 2025 protests of AMU students, they have raised the issue that JIH-SIO-Talha Mannan (JSTM) have not raised — their explicit and candid objection to the UP government’s pre-existing order (March 2025) banning roadside namaz. The JIH-SIO-Talha Mannan (JSTM) have maintained a silence on the said government order and he chose to take on the AMU Proctor who was trying to ensure that the UP government’s specific order doesn’t get violated. Such a shift of the student protest from being against the Proctor to making it against the Yogi government’s police, gave a pretext to the Yogi-led government’s police to launch a crackdown against the students who had already undergone the stun-grenade horror on December 15, 2019. [The immediate prelude of this horror itself awaits an expose]. That is how JSTM itself got the AMU students’ protest menacingly policed. Rather than accepting his own fault he is shifting the blames on the said three authors. This is sheer mischief.

Let it be noted that the AMU students began their protests on or before August 4, 2025, against the procedurally flawed fee-hike. Talha Mannan (TM) jumped into it five days later, on Friday August 8, 2025. The JIH-SIO-Talha Mannan (JSTM) remained silent on all the days of protests, preceding Friday August 8, 2025. Till August 8, no written statement, press communiqué of the JSTM has been found on the issue of fee-hike. Let it also be noted that in September 2024, the MANUU administration cancelled the students’ union elections scheduled for September 23, 2024. Talha Mannan (TM), contesting the MANUU Students’ Union elections, didn’t intensify his agitation there in Hyderabad, the way he suddenly jumped into the AMU protest on August 8, 2025 to make more vociferous demands for the right to roadside namaz and less for every other issue such as the procedurally flawed fee-hike and demand that elections for the AMU Students’ Union (AMUSU) be held. The JSTM was nowhere to be seen when the AMU girl students were protesting against power-cuts and the agitated girl students were maltreated by Proctorial professors in April 2025

Is it a case then that the JIH rarely exposes the ills within “Muslim managed or Muslim dominated” institutions, unless there is an intra-Muslim, sectarian disputes (for instance, a few months ago, there was a social and Urdu media outrage by JIH against the Darul Uloom, Deoband)? If the answer is in the affirmative, then this pathology that affects Muslim politics needs a deeper scrutiny. AMU has got many systemic flaws, such as a problematic localism, inbreeding (not only in enrolments, recruitments but also in the composition of the Executive Council (EC), in empanelling VCs and in recruiting higher officers and teacher-administrators, highly damaging the quality of academia. The long continuation of a handful of academically laggard teachers within AMU governance (who also extract lots of illegal benefits), and highly disproportionate preponderance of western UP + Azamgarh, financial and other corruption and irregularities, occupation of hostels by non-bonafide ex-students and hoodlums, massive corruption in contracts for supplies and civil constructions, patronage of AMU administration to certain dubious persons doubling as suppliers-contractors, and (also) a massive inflow of AMU teachers into majoritarian saffron outfits to curry favours (such as appointments to VCs!!). Why must posts of ad hoc Controller, ad hoc Finance Officer, ad hoc Registrar, too many Directors & OSDs must continue endlessly? Why must only a particular OSD get driver and security?

These serious, festering issues that plague AMU have, so far not  found any comprehensive expose’ from ‘Muslim bodies’ and their ‘leaderships.’

Besides Talha Mannan (TM)’s duplicity and cunningness, he is also self-contradicting himself and appears confused. At one place he calls Bhavuk’s position (“Why Protests at AMU take a Rightward Shift?”, LinkedIn, August 14, 2025) as being governed by his “Hindu, upper-caste” upbringing, while on the other he speculates Bhavuk’s write-up to be doing with his flawed “Left-Liberal” framework.

Historically speaking, within AMU, students’ protests often acquire a strand of demonizing the Left (the surkha) and then mobilizing [Muslim] students by raising the bogey of “Islam in Danger”..

TM has tried to misrepresent Bhavuk’s position as if he wrote against Namaz per se, which is absolutely false. I haven’t come across any of his writing stating that. The only point, if I haven’t missed something, Bhavuk was trying to make was the refusal to engage with and oppose the UP government’s order (March 2025) banning Namaz by the SIO or the protesters. According to Bhavuk, what Talha instead chose to do was holding the Proctor responsible for not letting Namaz be performed at the protest site as if the Proctor, and not the UP government, that had imposed the ban. [The JSTM seems to be unaware of the fact that the University Road of AMU from the Bab-e Syed to the Centenary Gate isn’t owned by the AMU; it is only used by the AMU; its ownership lies with the Aligarh Nagar Nigam].

What Bahvuk insisted on was that the JSTM has almost side-tracked the central issue of fee-hike which concerns all religious communities and atheists of AMU, and has (TM included) turned it into a Muslim identitarian issue. The AMU alumni too jumped into it only after August 8, insisting to speak only on the namaz issue (an audio conversation between an ex-student leader, Amir Mintoe and the Proctor, Prof. Wasim Ali had been circulated).  Such a twist and turn given by the JSTM weakened overall student solidarity. Also, the battle against the AMU administration was turned into battle against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government. Tactically this was a dangerous shift. The student protesters (vulnerable in the face of the BJP’s Neo-Hindutva regime) were made to confront the state and BJP, and less the AMU administration. This was exactly what was needed to weaken student’s mobilization and protest, while strengthening the AMU administration. This was also how and when (August 8, 2025) the JSTM gave a cause to the police to meddle into the affairs of AMU, the protests. Who then is responsible for involving the police in student protests? It is Talha Mannan, the JSTM; not the three writers Talha is trying to shift blame on.

The JSTM collusion with the functionaries of the Muslim managed institutions and JSTM’s prejudices in favour of privileged elite-powerful segments of Muslims (in this case, the AMU administrators) have become sharp and evident during and after the protest of August 2025.

TM does not talk about the timing of the Students’ Union elections previously agreed on in December 2025, after the semester examinations. JSTM has no questions on the refusal of the AMU administration to convene the Students’Union elections in August-September 2025.

It is quite well known that in December 2025, after the end-semester exams, most of the distant provinces’ hostellers leave for their respective homes in Bihar, Bengal, Assam, Kerala and Kashmir. Those left are the ones living closer to Aligarh i.e. the western UP students. Would not this leave the field open for the western UP lobby (aligning with the Azamgarh lobby) to gain control of the Students’ Union? AMU has already been quite infamous for its regionalism and factional politics and this chaotic-chauvinistic power play and such non participative elections will heighten this trend.

Faultline with the JIH’s Worldview 

Why is it that the tone and tenor of the speech by TM makes us believe that Muslim majority campuses are being conceived and portrayed as Muslim exclusive spaces where the Hindu minority is not to be taken along? Constitutionalism’s selective use and the disdainful attitude of the JIH and RSS towards the Constitution is no secret. That the JIH had allied with the saffron forces in 1975 is too well known a fact to be repeated here especially after the publication of Anderson’s and Jaffrelot’s works on the Emergency. Pan-Islamism finds endorsement from TM in the politics of Muslim victimhood where Islamic solidarity is concealed. The Indian saga of the Islamisation of Knowledge (IOK) project is not a problem for the left, liberal or Hindu Right Wing government. Chosen Muslims associated with it do not face problems in any of these regimes in fact all such characters find reward with some position of power. While Saffronisation is critiqued, Islamisation is spared. This double standard is not going to help in the fight against Hindutva. In fact such an attitude has helped in Hindutva attaining power.

Tragically, Muslim reactionary are even today strong enough to send a clear message to the non-Muslim students of AMU that even in today’s era of Hindutva hegemony, writing against the all-powerful Indian Home Minister is easy but a Hindu minority of AMU cannot write against the Muslim Right Wing. All AMU insiders know too well that the JIH wields a significant influence within the structures of AMU. It was these fundamentalist forces which ensured that Prof. Irfan Habib wasput under suspension in 1981. When Abrar Kashif came to a Mushaira in Kennedy auditorium last year (2024), the applause of the students on his “Pan-Islamic” nazm exhorting Mujahids (soldiers) from Afghanistan and Khurasan, had put the University to shame, drawing widespread criticisms on the social-media. Why it is so was easily forgotten that, Pan-Islamism had created a Hindu consolidation post-Khilafat Movement, which eventually became one of the factors in the Partition of India? Lala Lajpat Rai (1865-1928) had worked in collaboration with the Khilafat Movement. But soon after, he realised the dangers of Pan-Islamism and turned into a critic of anyone invoking this phenomenon. Among the Muslim intellectuals, only Intezar Hussain has had the moral courage to admit this in his biography of Hakim Ajmal Khan, Ajmal-e Azam (1999).

The JIH’s stated aim is creation of a theocratic state and for achieving this purpose they need to enhance the numbers of the Muslim population even by conversion (Dawat). JIH’s love for Muslim majoritarianism is no secret. Hence, their slogan, Islam ki Dawat, provides justification for the Hindutva project of Shudhi, Ghar Waapsi. Just see the resemblance between JIH’s Hukumat e Ilahi (Divine Governance) and Non Biological, Parmatma appointed PM!

No wonder then that the saffron outfits insisted for performing “Hanuman Chalisa” inside the AMU campus, a t funded residential university of the Indian state. It was after the call for “Islam ki Dawat” came from JSTM on August 8, 2025, that the call for Hanuman Chalisa inside AMU was echoed by saffron outfits as a “package deal”. The announcement was made by Hindu Raksha Dal’s state convener, Gaurav Sisodia, who was later placed under house arrest in Ghaziabad to prevent him from reaching Aligarh (The New Indian Express)!

This guilt is confessed by the JSTM kind of forces with the fact that the officially uploaded video-clip of TM’s speech (of August 8, 2025 at the Bab-e-Syed of AMU) has edited out the TM’s slogan of “Islam ki Dawat”.

It also needs to be stated that the AMU has a few dozen mosques (pesh-Imams, paryer leaders paid salaries by the University Grants Commission-UGC!), and not a single temple! This, by the way is an issue with Hindus students, even beyond those inclined towards majoritarian Hindutva. This policy is even at variance with the Holy Quran itself since the Quran says La IkraHa Fil Deen meaning there is no compulsion in the matter of religion (it appears in Surah-al Baqrah verse 256 also) and Lakum Deenukum Waliya Deen meaning for you is your religion and for me is mine. JSTM’s Dawat is in sharp contradiction with this verse of Quran. JIH’s Dawat would/should be seen as ominous by Liberal-Left and a tool for the Neo-Hindutva state power to repress the Muslims and reinforcing the stereotype of Muslims as radicalised bigots!

Thus the JSTM in this agitation stands as a culprit of putting India’s Muslims in great danger of repressive Hindutva state.

Sir Syed was against Pan-Islamism and he was a rational interpreter of the Quran. Maududi in his book Tanqeehat, attacks Sir Syed for borrowing “western thought” and inculcating western values into them. It is an irony that the very students benefiting from the fruits of Sir Syed’s enterprise are in solidarity and sometimes even having intimate collusion with such organisations opposed to Sir Syed’s vision. JIH’s duplicitous politics of Muslim majoritarianism in Islamic countries and minoritarianism in India stands thoroughly exposed, by now. Talha cannot play both ways. TM’s play of Victimhood Syndrome, while ground realities of victimisation of disenfranchised and poor Muslims are addressed more by the Liberal-Left. Not so unreasonably, a distinguished Aligarhian, K M Ashraf (1903-1962) clubbed JIH with CIA in his slim book (in Urdu) on Hindustani Muslim Siasat.

These Muslim communal organisations who play the victimhood card, reflect a form of minoritarianism while, on the other hand, rubbishing all secular-democratic forces. They attack Hindu majoritarianism in the rest of India while promoting Muslim majoritarianism within a Muslim majority campus. AMU cannot be expected to exist as a Vatican. Only Liberal-Secular Constitutionalism can guarantee minority rights. Islamist Minority Right Wing (and Pan Islamic politics) can only enable Hindutva.

Muslim reactionary forces such as JSTM must realise that it is not they who provide Rs 1200 crores to a modern university called Aligarh Muslim University (AMU). This fund comes from the Indian state because of its Liberal-Secular Constitution, which JSTM disdains. The bid, even now made, of minority communalists of converting Hindus to Islam in order to establish a Hukumat-e-Ilahiya, is a dangerous game. It needs to be unequivocally shunned. We have seen enough destructions of humans and values by the Salafi regime in Saudi Arabia and by the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

(The author is a former student who has requested anonymity, he graduated in Sunni Theology from the AMU after studying at the Nadwat-ul-Ulema-Editors)

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The post Is AMU, a Vatican of India’s reactionary Muslim elite? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Maninagar, I have been told, was Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s initial political karmabhoomi during his formative years. While covering Sachivalaya for the Times of India (1997-2012), a senior bureaucrat told me that during the Emergency days (1975–77), Modi would hide in the house of an RSS pracharak to avoid arrest. This babu, who retired a few years ago and lived in Maninagar, told me he personally knew this RSS pracharak, “a simple soul, always ready to help.”

A known Hindutva bastion, Modi represented the Maninagar constituency in the state legislative assembly thrice — 2002, 2007, and 2012. Expectedly, following the stabbing incident, in which the accused happens to be a Muslim and the victim a Hindu, there was strong protest led by the saffron brigade over the alleged failure of the administration, led by a Christian principal, to keep outlaws in the school under control.

Following the ghastly incident, I happened to interact with the principal of another school. Fear was writ large on his face: what if such an incident happened in his school? Wouldn’t he be beaten up like the Seventh Day School principal was? What if a similar crowd entered his school premises? He had no clue how to control it, nor any idea how to deal with what he called “increasing incidents of violence among schoolchildren, which we are witnessing in front of our own eyes.”

Even as I was speaking with this principal, I came to know that the Ahmedabad district education office (DEO) had called a meeting of school principals where discussions were held on how to prevent incidents like the one in the Maninagar school. I asked this principal what had happened in the meeting. While I wasn’t apprised of the details, he told me he had taken “a few precautionary measures.”

And what were these? “We have started checking the school bags of all the children studying in secondary classes, and we confiscated whatever sharp objects were found,” the principal revealed, adding, “While scissors were found in many children’s bags and we took them all, telling them they were in our lock and key and would be returned when they had crafts period, three children had knives in their bags.”

The principal claimed — and this struck me like a bolt from the blue — “All three were Muslims. One of them carried a rather long knife, which the child told me was used for slaughtering goats. We called the child’s father, whose immediate reaction was that his son was being targeted because he was a Muslim. I told him, we don’t discriminate on religious lines; otherwise, we wouldn’t be admitting Muslims in our school.”

The principal, who headed a private school, further claimed that he had “observed” violent incidents happening “mostly among students admitted under the 25 percent quota for socially and economically backward children under the Right to Education Act. They study for free, for which the government compensates us. We cannot fail them till they reach the eighth standard. They have to be compulsorily promoted. They can’t be rusticated either. So, they become careless. In my school, 50 percent of these children are Muslim.”

A teacher with whom I later interacted told me that in his school — one of the better ones providing “quality” education — following the school authorities’ directions, “we search the children’s bags of one classroom every day. It’s such a headache. Many children — especially those admitted under RTE — are found to keep some sharp object in their bags. Some remove the screw from the pencil sharpener and keep the blades in their bags. Do we teach children or do this security check?”

I mentioned all this to someone close to me. This person, who did not want to be named, said that while he couldn’t comment on the Seventh Day School incident per se, in the late 1990s and 2000s, when he studied at a top Ahmedabad school, he personally witnessed how Muslim children were targeted. “One of the very decent boys, a brilliant one, would be called ‘Oy Miya,’ used as an insult; he was rarely addressed by name. He wouldn’t react, but surely this is the type of atmosphere that prevails in many schools. One must understand the psychology of such children.”

I was reminded of what a well-known cultural personality told me when we met around the time I joined the Times of India in 1993 as part of my acquaintance drive. He told me about a top school, preferred by Gujarati parents for their children. Telling me his daughter studied there, he said, “A day ahead of the 15th August function, the teacher told the children they must compulsorily attend flag hoisting, underlining, ‘those who don’t attend are Miyabhai.’ My daughter asked what is this Miyabhai… I was at a loss to tell her the teacher was spreading communal hatred through such a statement.”

Courtesy: CounterView

The post Knives in schoolbags, hatred in classrooms: The dark lessons of Ahmedabad’s Maninagar appeared first on SabrangIndia.

[Note: Before proceeding, I should situate myself: I studied Literature at AMU between 2015–2018 and lived in one of its hostels. This is not to claim privileged insight, but to underline that my reflections come from lived proximity rather than distant observation.]

The recently aborted student protest at Aligarh Muslim University (AMU)—ostensibly about reviving the Students’ Union (AMUSU) rather than resisting the fee hike—offers a troubling yet instructive window into the nature of campus politics at AMU.

A Legitimate Beginning

At the outset, it must be remembered that the agitation began on a legitimate plank: the arbitrary and unjustified fee hike. For many students from modest backgrounds, AMU’s subsidized education is their only ladder to upward mobility. Their resistance was therefore natural and justified. The protest was marked by determination and—crucially—visible leadership from female students who camped at Bab-e-Syed. Their resilience forced the administration to roll back the hike to 20%.

But soon, the focus shifted.

The Twist

Before engaging with this shift, a brief background is essential. AMUSU—short for Aligarh Muslim University Students’ Union—was, in principle, meant to bridge the administration and the student community by offering effective representation. In practice, however, its history paints a sorry picture.

Supporters romanticise AMUSU as a “nursery for leadership,” pointing to names like Azam Khan and Arif Mohammad Khan. Yet, since 2017, when the University suspended it on the flimsy pretext of law and order, AMU has remained without an elected student body. The suspension was arbitrary and undemocratic, contradicting the very spirit of a university as a space for debate, dissent, and contrarian thought.

Reality, however, diverges sharply from the romanticism. Over the past decade, AMUSU has drifted far from its founding purpose. Most office-bearers—barring rare exceptions—have been academic underperformers or regional strongmen who treated the Union as a launchpad for failed political careers or as a network for contracts, patronage, and admissions. Regionalism thrived through collusion with faculty members from their own provinces, while the welfare of the broader student body remained a mere veneer. Unsurprisingly, AMUSU enjoys little respect among ordinary students.

Against this backdrop, the fee hike protest had nothing to do with AMUSU elections. Yet, seeing a readymade platform for mobilization, the AMUSU lobby opportunistically inserted itself. For a few days, they kept the rollback of fees as the visible agenda and AMUSU revival as a secondary one. But when their chances dimmed, anxiety set in. Their desperation

was rooted in past failures—one prominent activist had even approached the Supreme Court with a contempt petition citing the Lyngdoh Committee, only to have it dismissed in July 2025, a fact he concealed from fellow students. With the fee protest gaining momentum, the lobby saw its golden chance: a mass movement they could never build on their own was suddenly available to hijack.

How AMUSU Aspirants Hijacked the Fee-Hike Protest

Sections of students who had long lobbied for AMUSU elections—despite lacking credibility among peers—seized the protest as a platform to advance their agenda. History shows that AMUSU has ceased to represent students in any meaningful sense. Much like Ambedkar’s critique of Indian villages as “sink of localism, a den of ignorance, narrow mindedness, caste and communalism,” AMUSU has degenerated into a den of factionalism, patronage, and regressiveness.

Rather than critiquing, confronting and exposing systemic issues—declining academic standards, nepotistic faculty and administrative recruitments, inbreeding in admissions, or entrenched elites’ dominance—the AMUSU camp staged hunger strikes and moral dramas, allegedly under the blessings of a Law professor and the Eastern UP faction. These theatrics were less about student welfare and more about arm-twisting the administration.

Gender Insensitivity and Hypocrisy

Equally glaring is the hypocrisy. The same AMUSU hopefuls who now cloak themselves in the language of student rights were absent when female students were mishandled by the Proctorial team during protests over electricity shortages. Their selective silence exposes a deep gender insensitivity. Worse, when the fee hike protesters—mostly girls—refused to be co-opted, they were abused, branded “dalals,” and smeared on social media.

A movement that cannot respect women within its own ranks stands discredited- and rightly so.

The Deal with the Administration: Regional Politics at Play

Perhaps the most disturbing development was the timing of the administration’s assurance to the hunger striker: elections in December, after semester exams. This timing was no coincidence. By then, most outstation students—from Bihar, Bengal, the Kerala, and Kashmir

—would have left, leaving the electoral field to Western UP students and their Azamgarh allies.

Why not hold elections in August–September, when all students are present? Neither the administration nor the hunger striker offered a convincing answer. Their silence reeks of sub- regional opportunism.

What Went Off the Agenda?

Equally telling is what disappeared from the protesters led by hunger striker’s list of demands:

1. School fee hikes—despite RTE 2009 and the active role of Ahmadi School students— were quietly dropped, even though they had kept Centenary Gate closed till 19 August
2. Administrative accountability—the demand for replacing the Proctor, Director (Schools), and Controller of Exams was abandoned. The moment students pressed for the removal of the long-serving ad hoc Controller (a local appointee with entrenched clout), the entire protest was abruptly called off before sunrise on 19

This sequence exposes the deeper malaise: protests shaped less by genuine grievances than by the compulsions of entrenched elites.

The Larger Picture: Opportunism of the Muslim Elite

This episode raises uncomfortable questions not only about AMU but about India’s Muslim elites more broadly:

1. Why do entrenched cliques, clouts, lobbies monopolize university offices and student bodies?
2. Why is regional dominance—particularly of Western UP and Azamgarh—normalized, while voices from other provinces are systematically muted?

• Why do organizations like SIO or IYF remain silent on nepotism, gender insensitivity, or ad hoc appointments, yet selectively speak up when AMUSU’s revival is at stake?

The answer is crude opportunism. These elites are less invested in reform than in safeguarding their own hegemony.

Conclusion

The August 2025 AMU protests reveal a painful truth: genuine student concerns—fee hikes, gender justice, transparent governance, fair examinations—were eclipsed by the opportunism of a narrow faction bent on reviving AMUSU for self-interest.

The December election timeline, the abandonment of school fee issues, the silence on the ad hoc   appointments of high administrative officers/directors that too from within the internal teachers , and the abuse of female protesters expose the agitation for what it was: a cynical power       play.   Far      from sacrifice,               the    hunger    strike    was    political theatre. And the administration, complicit through opaque bargains, stands equally discredited.

In the end, one is left asking: was this agitation ever meant to empower students, or was it always designed to pressure the Hon’ble Supreme Court, which heard the case of VC’s appointed on 18 August 2025; the Petitioners, too, in the said case are insiders; and protect sub-regional dominance?

The anatomy of this protest leaves little doubt: AMUSU and the AMU administration mirror each other’s failures. Together, they embody what is wrong with entrenched elite politics of Muslims—visionless, opportunistic, and hostile to the aspirations of common students.

(The author of this article known to the Editors chooses to remain anonymous)

The post Power, Patronage, and Protest: The Making of AMUSU’s Opportunism appeared first on SabrangIndia.

First things first: it is necessary to clear away the red herrings. Mannan asserts that I, along with Bhavuk Sharma, “overlook that Hindu religious activities already occupy the public space in Kanwariya processions, Jagratas, Durga Pujas, Bhandaras, Matki Phodna, etc.” According to him, this ignorance leads me to celebrate JNU as “the most ideal, secular, and diverse campus” without calling those who celebrate Holi there as “Hindu right-wing.” “However, when Muslims mark their presence,” Mannan notes, “their practices are quickly pathologised, evoking a strong sense of injustice. What is celebrated as culture by the majority is often labeled communal when practiced by minorities.” This is supposed to be illustrative of the “double standards” that he later accuses me of holding. 

I have never expressed any admiration for JNU’s practice of holding Holi. However, since Mannan raises this example, I can clarify my own position. My outlook is closer to that of K. N. Panikkar, a staunch secularist who served as Professor of Modern Indian History at the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU). Panikkar’s reflections emerge from both experience and theory. He recalls an incident soon after joining JNU, when students approached him for a contribution toward an Eid celebration. His refusal, grounded in the conviction that universities should remain free from public displays of religiosity, immediately provoked hostility. He was branded a “Hindu communalist” for declining to participate in a Muslim festival. Later, when he resisted a similar attempt to celebrate a Hindu festival, he met with the same disapproval and imagined that, had he not been Hindu by birth, he would have been dismissed as a Muslim communalist instead.

For Panikkar, the episodes of campus religiosity revealed more than just the personal difficulty of being misread; they crystallised the structural impossibility of escaping communal labeling once religion enters the campus as public spectacle. His critique of the Indian model of secularism is telling here: it circumscribes “social consciousness within religious parameters and thus keep[s] the possibility open for particularistic and antagonistic tendencies to re-emerge at opportune moments…It keeps religion in play and in turn enhances religiosity; it preserves and projects religious identities and thus increases the social distance between different religious communities.” Public celebration on campus, whether Hindu or Muslim, therefore cannot achieve neutrality or solidarity. It generates a long-term dynamic towards the religiocisation of social life, thus preparing the ground for the eventual emergence of communalism. This is also why such practices hold little appeal for me. The alternative to it is pithily outlined by Panikkar: “a frontal confrontation with religion – an all-out critique of religion, with a view to its eventual negation – ‘a resolute, positive, abolition’ in the words of Marx.”

The Exclusions of Religion

Now that the red herring is out of the way, I can address Mannan’s main arguments. Basing himself upon Dr. Ishtiaq Hussain’s article “The AMU Fee Hike Agitation and a Misleading Narrative,” Mannan says that the “Friday prayer is not a festival or a political act but a religious duty, a widespread and common culture of the Muslim students at the Indian universities all over the country”. I have already critiqued Hussain’s piece in my own article “The AMU Fee Hike Agitation and the Fallacy of Harmless Faith”. 

There, I argue that Hussain is plagued by a contradiction: on the one hand, he says that the Friday prayer was a “mere manifestation of religious identity or general religiosity”; on the other hand, he praises the students’ restraint in not continuing to organise prayers at the protest site: “they rejected calls from fringe groups to organise prayers on August 15 to prevent the protest from acquiring a religious overtone.” This shift negates Mannan’s celebratory rhetoric and implicitly acknowledges that prayer in public, especially when tied to a protest, cannot be reduced to “mere obligation” but is always susceptible to political meaning. If prayer were simply harmless, its repetition would not have required avoidance. The fact that Hussain frames its absence as evidence of political maturity suggests an awareness that faith and politics cannot be neatly separated, that there is no “general religiosity”. 

Religiosity itself is historically and institutionally constituted through political antagonisms: whether through colonial governance of religion, postcolonial state regulation of minority identity, or the identitarian agendas of Muslim elites. Hussain’s need both to defend prayer as harmless and to celebrate its absence already shows that religion cannot be cordoned off from politics, but is always entangled with it. By extension, Mannan’s attempt to portray the Bab-e-Syed prayer as a “religious duty” evades the question of what this religiosity means in its concrete setting. He asks us to accept religious obligation at face value, framing it as a call for “belonging, survival, and self-respect in a hostile political environment”. But “belonging, survival, and self-respect” for whom? Mannan presumes that the Islamic community he is addressing is an unproblematic entity, grounded in the simplicity and unity of all Muslims. But this is patently untrue, as is revealed by the analysis of the patriarchal Islamism embedded in the form of the Friday prayer at AMU.

This becomes clear when set against Tahrir Square in 2011, where prayer unsettled hierarchies. Muslims prayed under the protection of Coptic Christians and reciprocated by safeguarding a Coptic Mass, transforming ritual into a civic language of solidarity. Men and women prayed shoulder to shoulder, erasing the partitions that usually govern Salat. Even the khutba shifted, as Yusuf al-Qaradawi opened with “O Muslims and Copts! O children of Egypt!” dissolving the privilege of the ummah as sole addressee. In Tahrir, the form of prayer itself changed, becoming a medium for revolutionary equality and civic solidarity. Insofar as religiosity became a mode for bringing all Egyptians together against an authoritarian, neoliberal government, it lost the doctrinal exclusivist of faith, transforming into a broad-based culture. As Panikkar remarks, “The culture of the people, when divorced from faith, would provide the necessary channel for communication.”

The impossibility of imagining such a scene at AMU reveals the limits of Mannan’s narrative. The institutional history of AMU has been structured by women’s marginalisation, both spatially and ideologically. As Amber H. Abbas notes, women’s education has never been central to the university’s corporate life, with hostels situated kilometers from the centre and students’ visibility tightly controlled. The political culture of the campus has long been punctuated by moral panics over women’s public presence: the IYF’s 2024 statement against “indecency” in cultural programs, the 2019 poster depicting women as caged birds in need of protection from feminism, and the 2018 “blasphemous” picture case that criminalised students for a Facebook post. In each instance, religious and moral rhetoric has operated as a technology of control, limiting women’s movement, attire, and speech. 

This patriarchal Islamism has continued in the fee hike protests. Female fence-sitters have been branded as dalals, singled out through a steady churn of Instagram reels, WhatsApp clips, and public shaming rituals. These gendered attacks go beyond ordinary political name-calling. In one case, a young woman labelled a dalal publicly apologised for her stance, only to be praised not for her reasoning but for appearing in a dupatta and mask, which are visual markers of propriety in the Islamist worldview. In another, a leading female protester who had worn an abaya but opposed prolonging the agitation became the target of AI-morphed videos, abaya-clad parodies, and relentless online mimicry. 

Mannan’s framing of prayer as “duty” effaces the religio-patriarchal codes that structure the act and that spill over into other aspects of the protests. It asks us to treat ritual as self-contained, even when its performance re-inscribes institutional hierarchies. The contrast with Tahrir makes the stakes visible: if prayer can serve as a vehicle of revolutionary solidarity in Cairo and as an instrument of patriarchal closure in Aligarh, then it cannot be reduced to “general religiosity.” Mannan’s refusal to recognise this variability is itself political, since it secures the authority of religious form by denying that its meaning is always shaped by context, exclusion, and struggle.

Protecting Religion?

Mannan rightly stresses AMU as a “blessing for marginalised Muslim students who are left out of the mainstream of the Indian education system”. Why should “standing up” for AMU be imagined primarily in terms of praying in public or asserting religiosity? How is it that “strength, hope, and the existence of Indian Muslims” is made to signify faith above all else? This conflation is visible in the equivalence that Mannan draws between the protest slogan “Islam Ki Dawat Zinda Hai” and Qur’anic verse on AMU’s insignia, “Taught man what he knew not”. 

The verse, “Taught man what he knew not” (96:5), speaks about knowledge as a universal gift to humankind. Its reference is pedagogical, epistemic, and humanistic, placing education at the heart of AMU’s mission. It is a declaration of enlightenment and learning as common goods, accessible to every seeker, irrespective of faith. When this verse becomes the motto of AMU, it does not serve as a sectarian banner but as an emblem of secular modernity grounded in a universal conception of education. Its force lies in its generality, in its refusal to delimit who can or cannot partake in knowledge.

By contrast, the slogan “Islam Ki Dawat Zinda Hai” is not a neutral affirmation of knowledge but an assertive invocation of religious community. As Mannan puts it in his article, “A truly democratic system should enable Muslims to express their reality in their own terms, whether it is religious, cultural, or political, without being imposed into a pre-packaged ideology of others [emphasis mine]”. In other words, Islam should be a self-enclosed entity, immune from any influence exerted by non-Islamic others, or those who question the centrality of Islam in public life. In contrast, the Qur’anic verse addresses the universality of education, negating religious belonging to highlight the mission of imparting knowledge to those who need it. The verse invites all to the pursuit of knowledge, while the slogan calls forth only Muslims as a collective in struggle. To conflate the two, as Mannan does, obscures the fact that the verse is secular in scope while the slogan is sectarian in thrust.

The danger in this conflation is that it justifies communal idioms in the name of institutional heritage. Mannan argues that using Islamic slogans is a continuation of AMU’s spirit, yet this argument ignores the categorical difference between Islam as a source of civilizational inspiration and Islam as a rallying cry of political identity. One can accept that AMU’s history draws on Islamic civilization without endorsing slogans that, in effect, doctrinally exclude non-Muslim students or cast political conflict in religious terms. His framing allows no distinction between cultural inheritance and religious mobilization, and thus erases the distinction required to preserve AMU’s universal educational mission.

The erasure of this distinction allows Mannan to naturalise religion/religiosity as a desirable good, whose possession has to be maintained at all costs. In fact, when Muslims occupy a position of dominance, Syed Jalaluddin Umri, former president of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH), counsels them to establish an Islamic state and govern it according to the laws of sharia. JIH’s student wing, the Students Islamic Organization (SIO), counts Mannan, its national secretary, among its leaders.

But is religion really that desirable? This question is not explored by self-assured theologians. Does the debate over AMU really concern the ability of students to protect their “Muslim Subjectivity,” or “Islam,” as Mannan insists? Put in more mundane terms, this would mean that the entire debate over AMU pertains to the Muslim youth’s right to recite Quranic verses in university premises. This seems more like the theologian’s dream, rather than a socially and economically disadvantaged student’s wish. The Supreme Court is correct in noting that what is primary in the determination of the minority character of an institution is not the “existence of a religious place for prayer and worship” or “the existence of religious symbols” but the objective of providing “benefit” to “a religious or linguistic minority community”. This means that “educational institutions could be established for minorities to provide secular education without imparting any lessons on religion”.

The Supreme Court’s observation about the general goal of providing “benefit” to “a religious or linguistic minority community,” rather than narrowly promoting faith or theology, forces us to ask the following question: is the attack on Indian Muslims really an attack on Islam as a theological system? The right to practice faith is just one among many human capacities that are being restricted. Even Muslims who are not particularly religious, who do not pray or wear visibly Islamic symbols, still face discrimination. Consider the following example. A study conducted in India tested hiring discrimination by sending out two nearly identical resumes for entry-level jobs. Both candidates had similar educational backgrounds, locations, and skills, with no photographs included to avoid visual bias. The only significant difference between them was their names: one had a recognizably Muslim name (“Habiba Ali”), while the other had a Hindu name (“Priyanka Sharma”).

Over eight months, 2,000 applications were sent for over 1,000 job listings. Despite being equally qualified, the candidate with the Muslim name received only half as many positive responses. This study underscores that discrimination against Muslims operates even in the absence of visible religious markers like dress, prayer, or religious expressions. Simply having a Muslim name, an ascriptive identity beyond personal choice, was enough to reduce opportunities, showing that the bias faced by Muslims in India is not necessarily about religious practice but about their very existence as Muslims. The issue is not about faith per se, but about the political and social vulnerability of a historically constituted, denominationally marked group. 

When the oppression is located at the level of Muslims-as-a-people, it becomes misleading to frame the defense of AMU or of Muslim students in overtly religious terms. To do so cements the very caricature produced by Hindutva, namely that Muslims are excessively, even obsessively, religious, and that every act they undertake flows from Islamic identity. This discursive trap is visible in the proliferation of “jihad” labels — “love jihad,” “population jihad,” “economic jihad,” even “corona jihad.” Hindu nationalists have already transformed ordinary social and economic practices into religious threats. In such a climate, when anti-secularists like Mannan elevate faith as the center of political self-definition, they unwittingly mirror Hindutva’s framework, reinforcing the notion that Muslim life can only be understood through the lens of excessive religiosity, as if every action was done for the sake of Islam’s theological sanctity.

The consequence of this is double-edged: on the one hand, it narrows the grounds of Muslim struggle to the defense of religiosity; on the other, it erases the broader human capacities that are being curtailed – education, economic opportunity, political participation, cultural flourishing. Faith is one dimension of human life, but not the sole or even primary capacity under siege. To focus resistance on religion alone is to surrender the universality of the claim: that Muslims, as equal human beings and citizens, are being denied the full range of their rights. 

For a genuinely emancipatory politics, the demand should shift from “protecting Islam” to “developing human capacities.” This means foregrounding the economic deprivation, lack of access to higher education, and structural discrimination that affect Muslims irrespective of their personal religiosity. It also means confronting internal hierarchies within the community: class divides, gender inequality, the marginalisation of Pasmanda Muslims, and the silencing of queer Muslims. Only such a politics can break from the religious template imposed both by Hindutva and by defensive communal rhetoric, moving toward a struggle that asserts Muslim dignity in its widest, most inclusive sense.

Indian Muslims thus are not just Muslims; they are full political, civic subjects whose rights and freedoms should not be contingent on religious identity. Instead of reacting to majoritarian pressures by asserting a religious counter-identity, the response of Indian Muslims should be: we refuse to be reduced to a religious category at all. The fight, then, is not for the recognition of Islam but for a secular space where no one – Muslim, Hindu, or otherwise – is pigeonholed by religious identity in the first place.

Questions

Given Mannan’s assertion that Muslims should “express their reality in their own terms” without paying attention the “pre-packaged ideology of others,” it is imperative to understand how such a politics of self-aggrandizement leads to the domination of those one considers to be “other”. I will attempt to show this through a series of questions for Mannan about the viewpoints espoused by his organization SIO (Student Islamic Organisation) or the parent organisation JIH (Jamaat-e-Islaami Hind). If Mannan’s vision is that Muslims should express their reality solipsistically, these questions expose the real-world implications of that worldview for gender, sexuality, and belonging.

On Sexuality and Homosexuality

• JIH describes homosexuality as “immoral and unnatural.” Do you believe that someone like Professor Ramchandra Siras of AMU deserved the humiliation, suspension, and eventual mysterious death he suffered simply for being gay?
• If homosexuality “destroys the family system,” as JIH says, do you acknowledge that many homosexuals themselves come from families, love their parents, siblings, and partners, and wish to build households of their own?
• Do you think the state has the right to police people’s private lives and consensual relationships inside their own homes?

On Women and Education

•  JIH calls for the abolition of co-education, effectively segregating women. While they are segregated, they should wear clothes that are “sober and dignified,” that “cover the body”. Can you explain why the burden of “preventing lust” falls entirely on women rather than teaching men self-restraint?
• Why should women’s dress be dictated by men in positions of authority? Does your logic not amount to blaming women for men’s violence?
• If women are forced into “separate” institutions and covered from head to toe, do you admit that what you call “modesty” is simply a system of control and surveillance over women’s bodies?

On Maududi and the SIO’s Intellectual Project

• Your student organization recommends Towards Understanding Islam, in which Maududi explicitly states, “there are certain women who do not mend their ways without a beating.” Do you condone the idea that men have the right to physically punish women in their households?
• Maududi asserts that men are naturally suited to govern the family because women have “natural limitations.” Given that Indian women today excel as doctors, engineers, judges, and university professors, do you claim these women are exceptions, or do you believe Maududi’s hierarchy still applies to all women?
• Maududi presents domestic confinement and withdrawal from public life as “freedom” for women. Do you agree that forcing women to stay at home, manage the household, and submit to male authority counts as true freedom?

On Equality and Democracy

• JIH advises Muslims to establish an Islamic state under sharia when they are in a position of dominance. Do you recognize that this vision is fundamentally at odds with the Indian Constitution, which guarantees equality before the law for all citizens?
• How do you justify advocating for laws that would make women second-class citizens, LGBT people criminals, and non-Muslims subjects of a religious order?
• If your worldview requires hierarchy, segregation, and surveillance to function, what place does it have in a modern secular university where equality is the very foundation?

Mannan will probably say that those who are raising such questions from a secular-liberal perspective are enacting “a kind of violence in the name of intellectualism”. His alternative, as we have seen, is to allow to “Muslims to express their reality in their own terms, whether it is religious, cultural, or political, without being imposed into a pre-packaged ideology of others.” Thus, instead of allowing the actions and thought processes of Muslims to be examined by others, Mannan wants the Muslim community to behave solipsistically, as if there is no disagreement about his religion-centric vision of politics. But I believe that it is only through democratic discussion and critique that Indian Muslims have any hope of reclaiming their future. 

 (The author is a student at the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), India. He is the author of the book “Education in the Age of Neoliberal Dystopia” (Midwestern Marx Publishing Press, 2024) and has a forthcoming book on Palestine and anti-imperialist political philosophy with Iskra Books)

Related:

Reluctant Democrats

Political History of India’s Two Muslim Universities since 1947

The post The Solipsism of Faith: A Response to Talha Mannan appeared first on SabrangIndia.