By Siddhant Mohan, TwoCircles.net
The protest of female students at the Banaras Hindu University is nowhere close to reaching its aims of ensuring a more safe campus, but the University administration and the district administration are far more interested in blaming each other for the incidents of September 23.
In his report submitted to the Chief Minister, Varanasi’s commissioner Nitin Ramesh Gokarna put all the blame over the BHU VC Prof GC Tripathi, saying he did not handle the situation well which led to violence on September 23.
But looking at the facts and after talking with the witnesses of the case, it becomes evident that the administration at Varanasi was equally responsible for what happened in the University.
As police resorted to lathi-charge in the night of September 23, official version put the action as it was the university’s proctorial board which lathi-charged first.
But as one student Rajkumar Singh told TwoCircles.net, “It is correct that first it was university’s proctorial board which charged at the students on the night of 23 September, but one must know that University’s proctorial board does not have such manpower and resources to handle such a crowd of students.”
According to the eye-witnesses of the first wave of lathicharge, soon the forces resorted to use tear gas, rubber bullets, pepper bombs and aerial firing of live bullets. This is an allegation which does not fit on the university’s weak and inadequate security setup, which is clearly not equipped with such weapons.
Also, it must be pointed out that during the second wave of lathi-charge which started at the university’s main gate, there was no University’s security official present. Contrary to the administration’s stance, Varanasi’s DM and SSP according to eyewitnesses accompanied the PAC men inside the university to charge at more of the students.
Female students of Mahila Mahavidyalaya have already accused district administration for beating and abusing girls by entering into the girl’s hostels.
One BHU student said, “DM and Commissioner are putting BHU on target as they were not involved in this. They worked in close nexus but now are busy blaming each other.”
The current blame game is a big change from the previous years, when both the University and district administration worked with each other even on controversial issues.
One example of their proximities surfaced in 2016, when a male student of Hindi department was raped in 2016 a few meters away from the VC lodge. As the university’s chief proctor turned down his request for complaint, city’s police did the same. It was only after the intervention of the media that an FIR was registered and the victim received medical examination. However, since this was done more than a week after the incident, a number of evidences had gone missing. Moreover, the police was not arresting the accused under University’s influence, and did so only after constant media pressure.
The recent protests and the outrage among students got too big for both the district administration and the University to handle. Abhishek Srivastava, a journalist and a BHU alumni, said that the recent issues had clearly created fissures between the two bodies. “Earlier, It was hard to differentiate the University with the Varanasi’s administration. They always worked closely. But this VC ruined that equation.”
Recently, BHU VC Tripathi had tried to put the blame over the SDM of Rajatalab of Varanasi, Isha Duhan, of being influenced by “JNU’s ideology” and fuelling the girls to endorse the protest. “When VC resorted to this blame game, it was obvious for city administration to put the blame back over to the VC which they did successfully,” added Srivastava.
There is one more factor which may be crucial in defining the rift between these two bodies. As the BHU VC, who is already in target of ABVP’s Thakur wing, is being blamed for what happened inside the campus, the students may start to believe more on the University’s administration. One local journalist told TwoCircles.net, “If VC is put on the centre of everything, then it is a good situation for the BJP. Students will believe more in the government.”
“The issue erupted when PM Modi was in Banaras, so someone had to take a blame. Since the BJP-led administration cannot be blamed, it must be dumped on BHU administration,” tells Sunil Yadav, alumni and social activist based in Varanasi. “If district administration would have taken the blame, it would have smeared the image of BJP even more.”
During the peaceful protest march carried out on September 24, Varanasi’s District Magistrate (DM) Yogeshwar Ram Mishra agreed to all the demands of the girl students which were actually made to the BHU’s administration. One student of the university said, “DM wanted us to believe that he can resolve our issue, which university cannot.”
As the DM has agreed to the demands, it creates a perception that district administration can help the university’s students better than its own administration. This is a point which may cause confusion and deviation among students. “If only DM had to agree to our demands, why did he use violence against us before, can he answer that?” asked a student.
Adding one more chapter to the blame game, UP’s chief minister Yogi Adityanath said yesterday that intelligence input was provided to BHU VC a night before the protest, which started next morning. But according to our sources, the input – which was based on social media – was provided around 2 AM on September 22, which gave little time to the University to do much to counter the protests. However, the University’s idleness in dealing with protest and student’s issues is also one of the crucial factors which sparked the protest.
Several BHU students were detained yesterday in Delhi while they were going to meet prime minister’s secretary to handout a memorandum. And here BHU has appointed a new proctor Royna Singh, as the first female proctor of the University. But the question still remains unanswered that was it VC who did everything or is he just being a scapegoat after the bond breakage between the administration and the University?