By: Kanak Lata Tripathi

Another day in New India, another attack on academic freedom.

 On March 16, the country woke up to news of the resignation of the renowned political scientist Pratap Bhanu Mehta from Ashoka University. “My public writing in support of a politics that tries to honor constitutional values of freedom and equal respect for all citizens, is perceived to carry risks for the university,” Mehta wrote.

In the subsequent days, scholars from across the world published a letter of solidarity, expressing their concerns over this dangerous attack on academic freedom. Included among the signatories was the President of Columbia University, Lee C. Bollinger.

For a country that gained its independence on the principles of non-cooperation and civil disobedience, the steady deterioration of freedom of speech and expression corrodes its democratic fabric.

Under Prime Minister Modi’s leadership, the current regime’s intolerance towards dissent has often manifested in targeted attacks towards universities, students, and professors.

In 2020, with the country reeling from both a humanitarian crisis and heavy economic losses brought on by the sudden lockdown, the government chose to redirect its focus to cracking down on dissenting professors. Anand Teltumbde, a scholar and former professor at the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, was arrested and charged with sedition and conspiring with insurgent groups— without any concrete evidence and based on broken linkages. Teltumbde has been at the forefront in fighting against casteist forces, and has worked to uplift the lower castes and marginalized sections of society, often challenging the dominant extremist Hindutva forces form the ideological wing of the ruling party. 

On the other hand, the likes of Kapil Mishra and Anurag Thakur, who have been recorded delivering incendiary speeches preceding the communal riots in the nation’s capital, New Delhi, continue to enjoy influential positions within the ruling party. While the two events are unrelated, they reflect the overarching misuse of national security as an excuse to further political propaganda.

With its actions in recent months, from the January 5 violent attack on unarmed students and professors of JNU to the restructuring of high school history textbooks, the government has sent a clear message: Universities are no longer encouraged to foster intellectual thought; they are no longer being given the flexibility to dissent, disagree, and exercise academic freedom.

Publicly funded universities form the backbone of higher education in India. In a slew of measures to further curtail academic freedom within universities, recent guidelines necessitate government approval for conducting international seminars by publicly-funded universities under the central government. Furthermore, the Ministry of Home Affairs has launched a program that enables anyone to report content that they may perceive as anti-national—allowing for a state of monitorial surveillance.

Despite a continuous crackdown on educational institutes, students and professors continue to embody and defend the fundamental rights to freedom of speech and expression enshrined in India’s Constitution. For a political party borne out of student protests, it is sadly ironic to watch the government strategically target dissent, debate, and discussion.