¡®Students should study.¡¯?
¡®Protesting is just a way for students to avoid studies.¡¯
These are just a couple of arguments you hear from politicians and the elder generations alike when it comes to student protests.?
Currently, dozens of universities across the country are protesting. Most in support of Jamia, AMU and against Delhi Police¡¯s method of dealing with protests against CAA and NRC. JNU has been protesting vehemently against the tremendous fee hike, and now even IIMC is protesting against the high fees.?
Student protests have changed the course of history, they have brought revolutions, they have brought down governments. But one wonders, why are students of a country the first ones to raise their voices against what they think is wrong??
Today, in the light of Jamia protests, let us chart some major student protests in history and talk about why exactly students think it's important to protest.?
This was one of the few protests across universities in India that led to the Emergency of 1975.?
Students of an engineering college in Ahmedabad started a protest against 20% fee hike in hostel food on December 20, 1973. A similar protest was carried out at Gujarat University on January 3, 1974, where students and the police clashed.?
The protesters demanded the immediate resignation of Chimanbhai Patel, the then CM of Gujarat. A statewide strike was organised on January 25 and eventually, the army was called, curfew imposed in 44 towns.? which ended with another round of clash between the police and protesters. The centre was forced to ask Patel to resign and the protests led to the dissolution of the state.?
The protests against illegal migrants in Assam are not new. In 1979, an agitation was launched in Assam by the All Assam Students Union, which is currently leading the protest against the recently amended Citizenship act.?
The protests aimed to protect and preserve the identity and culture of Assamese people after the influx of people from Bangladesh following 1971¡¯s War of Liberation. Eventually, the agitation was just by different sections of the society, not just the students and it ended in 1985, when the Assam Accord was signed. Student leader Prafulla Mahanta, who then headed the Asom Gana Parishad, became the chief minister in 1985 at the age of 35.
In 1989, Chinese students in Beijing¡¯s Tiananmen Square stood in front of the army. Their demand? A democracy. The students remembered the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, Hu Yaobang and demanded the government to implement his liberal democratic values.?
On June 3 students gathered for a protest to demand democracy by the protest was brutally suppressed by the People¡¯s Liberation Army. Hundreds of protesters were mercilessly killed in firing by the Chinese army. The students, however, continued to protest for seven weeks even after being beaten, amputated and killed.
China, as we know, did not become a democracy but the world got to know the brutalities Chinese were capable of. The international community criticised the Chinese regime and they were forced to look for ways to bring some democratic changes in the system.
There was a ¡°hok kalorob (let there be uproar)¡± movement at Jadavpur University in 2014. This was against the alleged police attack on unarmed students. The students demanded a fair inquiry into the alleged molestation of a student which took place inside the campus.?
The protest went on for a week and concluded with the removal of vice-chancellor Abhijit Chakraborty, who had allegedly allowed police to enter the campus.
The suicide of Rohith Vermula, the Dalit scholar of Hyderabad University, incited nationwide protests. The students protested against the university administration for failing to prevent his suicide.
?Vemula committed suicide after being one of the five students, who were expelled from the hostel by the university¡¯s executive council. The access to the campus was limited for these students for allegedly assaulting an ABVP student leader. His death became symbolic of the second class treatment some cases still face in independent India and students across the nation protested.?
The agitation against the extradition bill in Hong Kong, which was seen as a tool by the government to outlaw any citizen, who was seen as a threat to the government, garnered the world's attention because of the sheer number of youth that led the protests and how organised it all was.?
Students found innovative ways to tackle police weapons like tear gas. School and college students participated in these nationwide protests and the government was forced to take back its move.?
The ongoing protest by the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students' Union (JNUSU) are over the provisions in the Draft Hostel Manual. University students have been protesting against the fee hike, new deadlines and dress code introduced in the Draft.?
After the protests, there was a partial rollback in the hostel fee, "Only for students below the poverty line category" and removal of the provisions for curfew timings and dress code from the draft. There were however no changes in the hostel fee structure for BPL students who avail scholarships and for non-BPL students. Hence, the protests in JNU are ongoing.?
Now the question is, in any country, why are students the first ones to stand at the frontier of the protests when they feel the idea of their ¡®nation¡¯ or ¡®identity¡¯ is threatened?
In cases like the Nav Nirman Andolan of 1974 or the JNU protests of 2019 one can argue that the problems directly concerned the students, which is in fact true.?
JNU, is a public university, known for its inclusivity and affordability. Education should be accessible to all and before the tremendous fee hike at the university, it seemed it was. Student protests led the government to partially roll back the fee hike, but it still stands at a considerably higher amount than what it was before. Students have boycotted exams and classes. It is their right and their place to protest against something that directly affects them.?
What about the other protests? Students are the developing backbone of any country. Decisions are taken by the government acts passed in the parliament, are supposed to affect them the most in the longer run. Let us talk about India specifically. Our school history books taught us how the entire country rose in agitation against the British Raj to exist as an independent nation.?
Our civics books told us the that Constitution of the country does not discriminate on the basis of caste, religion or race, that it guarantees the right to equality to everyone. We have grown up with a certain idea of a nation, a secular one. When students enter college, their minds are young, acceptant, like wet clay that has the scope of being moulded. In that case, when the authorities try to disfigure and manipulate the idea of the nation they grew up with, or simply carrying out atrocities against one section of the society, it bewilders and angers them.?
The minds are young, the conscience strong- students do not have beliefs set in stone, they are still learning and that is their biggest strength. The conscience drives them towards calling out a spade a spade. There is an urge to do something, to stand up, to make the world a better place for the next generation. That is why you will see that the fight against climate change is led mostly by the youths- Our previous generations have lived most of their lives- what is coming has to be lived by the students and the coming generations.?
Students of a country strive towards an ideal existence- when they see that the authorities are leading them further away from that ideal, that instead of taking a step forward ten steps are being taken in the backward direction, there is rage, a sense of injustice and a feeling of betrayal because every government promises ¡®development¡¯.
Protests are a way to dissent, express unhappiness, anger. They are a way for the citizens of a country to let the government authorities know that they are not silent bystanders or passive cooperators.?
No community in the world prefers secondary treatment, and why should there be any? Women have fought for centuries to have a right to vote, to work, to education and that has what has gotten them at a position that they are in the world, which still is not equal to that of men.? The same is true for the transgender and queer community. The fight to not be discriminated on the basis of gender is ongoing, so is the fight against discrimination on the basis of race, by the black community.?
Students have learnt and even taught themselves that everyone deserves to be equal, and not discriminated against. Students strive for a world of equality because they are the citizens and leaders of tomorrow and also the caretakers of the coming generations.?