A division bench of Kerala high court, headed by Chief Justice Navniti Prasad Singh, in an interim order said that political activities had no place in academic institutions as the purpose of educational institutions is to impart education. The court ordered an end to campus politics, strikes and agitations in educational institutions in the state. The court also observed that political parties cannot hold campuses to ransom thereby violating the right of civilized students receiving education. The order was in response to a petition filed by MES College in Ponnani seeking the intervention of the court in an ongoing strike by SFI students. The order, as anticipated, created a flutter in the political landscape of the state with political parties cutting across the spectrum and student unions they foster crying wolf against the blanket ban ordered by the court.
The order, it is reported, will be challenged in the Supreme Court by political parties and their student unions. The majority of parents, however, would welcome this order since they are sick and tired of student union clashes on campuses, often instigated by unruly elements from within as well as outside. Clashes often turn violent reducing the silent majority of students to hapless onlookers. Politicians of course are rightly agitated by the verdict since many among them became 'leaders' and ministers through what is commonly known as 'student politics'. But for campus politics many of them would have landed in jobs that are too inconsequential to mention.
While one cannot wish away politics on campuses altogether since, as the saying goes, 'every question in the final analysis is political' or for that matter the dictum of Plato that 'man is a political animal'. The question is what kind of political activity is healthy, permissible and meaningful for students and institutions? It is in institutions of higher learning that young minds are awakened and ignited with thoughts, ideas and philosophical debates. Thesis and antithesis have a constructive role to play as it leads to synthesis of new ideas and new vision about society and humanity. Looking at the political scene on campuses today, one should not fail to see the total degeneration. Students are becoming increasingly disrespectful to teachers, principals and even the vice chancellors are not spared from their onslaught.
Angered by the verdict, Congress MLA Hibi Eden has asked, whether teachers do not have organizations? Unions of teachers with different political affiliations are a reality in Kerala. Even fringe political parties have their college teacher associations. The only difference is that no violent clashes are reported among them. Members of these unions often take sides during strikes and agitations of students, depending on their political patronage and even turn students against authorities. It is also not uncommon to see leaders of such unions sending their wards to apolitical campuses outside state for higher education. While the teacher has enormous opportunities to showcase his scholarship and humanity to inspire students to achieve greater heights in academic and scholarly pursuits, often their politics end up polarizing and dividing students. The teacher thus becomes an acceptable political role model for students to embark on strikes, agitations and indulge in vandalism and violence.
These unions vie with each other to get their nominees into statutory bodies of universities such as the senate, syndicate and the academic council as the Acts and Statutes of our universities are modelled along the lines of the legislature, purportedly with noble intentions. Opportunities to implement the agenda of the political parties they belong to are plenty in these bodies and debates and discussions often become boisterous and calumnious, throwing the decorum of such academic or administrative bodies to winds. Scholarly, meaningful and academic debates are often the casualty. It is not unusual that deliberations of these bodies in universities are conducted with a posse of police on the campus.
Elected to these bodies, nominees of political parties also have the privilege to appoint their chosen ones as chair or as a member of Board of Studies and faculty, as deans, examiners, hostel wardens and members of student disciplinary committees, to name a few, often overlooking academic credentials, seniority or reputation of many who are eminently suitable. They even exercise the power to choose or not to choose PhD thesis examiners. Even a student caught red-handed in copying in the examination can be let off if his political equations are right while the teacher who caught the student copying is incriminated and barred from examination duties. Acts and Statutes of our universities have lived their life and are no longer capable of addressing challenges faced by higher education in the liberalized and globalized era, but there is little political will to recast them to face those challenges.
Teachers like any other professionals have the right to their political beliefs and unionization, but the cardinal job of teacher is to impart instruction to students and inspire them to scale scholarly heights. The state of higher educational institutions in Kerala is pathetic with rapidly falling standards of education. Even university campuses where teaching and research have to go hand in hand are mired in student and teacher politics. It is not uncommon to witness teachers indulging in petty accusations and counter accusations, petitioning and counter-petitioning to higher authorities such as the vice chancellor, approaching the court to settle their quarrels or even locking up the cabin, cabinet or the laboratory of their bête noirs.
The interim order of the high court should be a wakeup call to student unions who feel that the court has exceeded its brief and encroached upon their democratic right to form unions backed by political parties. Instead of crying hoarse, all should realize this order is a call to introspect whether the intolerant, undemocratic and often violent methods and approaches that unions resort to are acceptable in a civilized society. Political parties have to do their homework to instruct their budding cadre in student wings to act and behave decently, responsibly and in a civilized manner without resorting to violence or vandalism to resolve their grievances whether it is on the campus or outside. Likewise, it is also time for teachers' unions to reflect whether their political activism has helped to vitiate the atmosphere on campuses and polarize students or has helped to further the academic and scholarly pursuits of their wards and mould them into better human beings with honesty, sincerity, fairness, justice and empathy as core values.
(The writer is a Professor at IIT Madras and former vice chancellor of the University of Kerala).
