School of Languages, JNU, New Delhi (Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/School_of_languages_JNU_Delhi.jpg)
— by Sriram Karri (via Facebook)
As an Objectivist (atheist, right-wing liberal) I have been watching the developments of the last few days at the Jawaharlal Nehru University with fascination, dread, helplessness, anger and bewilderment.
I am not just politically divided – I am opposed to Communism and Socialism as strongly as Religious Fascism, I am opposed to student politics and subsidy moochers as vehemently as those who initiate violence against protesters or misuse state machinery – but also personally divided – I have friends who are students in various campuses, journalists and editors who are protesting, soldiers and officers in the Army who are protecting the borders.
I have friends who support Modi, I have friends who oppose Modi – I have friends who want the JNU slogan shouters hanged to death, and I have friends who wanted them freed and the cops and ministers held accountable.
STUDENT POLITICS: The students who politic on campuses disgust me. They have no business doing what they are doing – SFI, NSUI, ASA, ABVP – all of them are converting campuses into political grounds. They are free to politic outside the campus, holding any flag. Free Campuses for Education is the need.
ANTI-INDIA SLOGANS: As someone who almost made it to the Indian Air Force through the National Defence Academy (NDA) route, I can only hold those who shouted against India, spoke of breaking it, in contempt. They are disgusting.
CONSTITUTION HAS 5 PREAMBLE VALUES: Those who speak on TV have all – on both sides – missed that there were originally three (Sovereign, Democratic and Republic) values; with two added later (Secular and Socialist). It is amazing those who support democracy and free speech to the highest degree feel no responsibility towards the sovereignty of the republic. Those who claim respect to sovereignty and republic want to use them to suppress democracy and secularism.
HATE SPEECH: As a country we have very strong laws, and strong social disapproval for hate speeches. Speeches against one religion, one caste, one community (except of course when speaking against businessmen, brahmins, etc). No one stood to say that these slogans and the speech was aimed against India and therefore should have attracted the provisions of hate speech.
STUDENT WORDS VERSUS GOVERNMENT ACTIONS: Here is where the issue fully tilts, alas. What the students on JNU campus are up to, their slogans, their professors condoning it, are all wrong, abominable, and deserve the strong consternation of most Indian citizens, taxpayers or not. If the government had just left the matter there…. but by going against them beyond the limit of law, and lawlessly, we must realize – no words of any student is as dangerous to a nation as the actions of government.
SEDITION, NEVER: What the Modi government did against them was too strong. This Kanhaiya fellow, make no mistake (among other things, his oratory is third-rate) is a deplorable creature. But Sedition was not his crime. The violence by legislators and lawyers in courts and streets is evil.
Today, I hate the BJP-led Modi government for having pushed me to stand by JNU students, their professors, intellectuals and journalists with Left agenda, communists and those who shouted against India.
But for a larger love called India – I would do even that. Today, and always.
