Velivada will stand, say students, as HCU admin pulls down banners, posters of Dalit Bahujan leaders

By Daisy K, TwoCircles.net

Nearly three years after the institutional murder of Rohith Vemula, the HCU administration led by Vice Chancellor  Appa Rao Podile continues with their mistreatment of Dalit Bahujan students on campus. On January 4, when students in HCU (Hyderabad Central University) got together for Velivada day, an event to commemorate the raising of Velivada, the administration removed the banners and posters of Dalit Bahujan leaders and dismantled the entire protest setup. The commemoration was part of a series of events leading to the Rohith Shahadath Din which is on January 17.

After the Velivada program, towards midnight the portraits of  Dr B.R. Ambedkar, Mahatma Jotirao Phule, Savitribai Phule, Gurram Jashua, Maa Ramabai Ambedkar, Periyar EV Ramasamy, Komaram Bheem, Chhatrapati Shahu Maharaj, Manyavar Kanshiram were taken away by the HCU administration. Not only this, four students have been served notices stating that appropriate actions will be taken. The students have stated that the notice which has not been accepted by the students have a series of false information regarding Dalit students.

Iniyavan B, Organising Secretary, ASA, HCU speaking about the incident said, “ Apparao is been investigated under the atrocity case, and Velivada being one of the evidence, we feel that they have actually tried to erase evidence.”

Velivada was raised by scholars Rohith Vemula, Dontha Prashanth, Vijay Pedapudi, Seshu Chemudugunta and Velpula Sunkanna on January 4, 2016, in protest of HCU administration as they boycotted the scholars from entering the hostels.

Speaking about the incident, Former Student Union President of HCU Sreerag Poickadan said they had a small gathering on January 4 to commemorate the raising of Velivada. “The next morning we noticed that the banners and posters had been removed by the administration…those photos have vanished and we can’t find them anywhere.”

This incident has taken place just days before Rohith Shahadath Din is to take place. ASA (Ambedkarite Students Association) released a statement saying that Velivada also stands as testimony to the atrocities committed against by Apparao and BJP against them. “Rohith Vemula spent his last days in this very same Velivada. Velivada means Dalit ghetto. Such ghettos usually exit at the margins of every village, but constructing a Velivada at the centre of this Brahmanic space must have sent shivers through the bones of this Brahmanical VC Appa Rao. We pledge that ASA will not stand idle at this atrocity. We demand that Velivada is returned to where it was. We will not rest until Velivada is raised.”

The students plan to conduct a protest rally today to condemn the administration’s move, under the banner for Justice for Rohith Vemula.

The HCU administration under the Vice Chancellor Appa Rao acting as an agent for the BJP-RSS combined in a series of decisions challenging the activities of the Ambedkarite students in HCU, leading to the expelling of five Dalit research scholars from the hostel in the campus in November 2016. It was the constant pressure put by then Union Ministers Bandaru Dattatreya and Smriti Irani along with the casteist stand of the HCU administration that prompted this extreme move. The scholars then moved to the North Shopping Complex of the HCU campus and stayed out in an open protest. This site became the protest site against the BJP government and the administration and came to be called Velivada-referring to the part of the village outskirts was Dalits had been forced to live within traditional caste society. Constant pressure from the administration and government led to the institutional murder of Rohith Vemula, one of the five expelled scholars on January 16, 2016. Since then, the Velivada has been a site of protest and resistance for the students of HCU.