My thoughts on the rumble in the JNU-gle

Just like most citizens of India, I have also been troubled by the happenings at the JNU campus. Both by what happened on Feb 9^th and also what it kicked off subsequently nationwide. I come from a typical middle class family where the emphasis was on the pursuit of good education which was, by virtue of plenty of examples, shown as a successful model for betterment in life on three fronts – intellectual, social and economic. Academic excellence was the top priority of a student, we were told in no unclear terms, and everything else was extra-curricular. And I am an engineer by qualification and thus my educational experience didn’t allow too much room for questioning (apart from clarifying questions) and debating. Raging, passionate and polarizing arguments on arcane concepts were largely absent through the years of my schooling. 

As mentioned earlier, I am from the archetypal urban, middle class family. Our parents were never impacted by a mill lockout, the vagaries of monsoon didn’t impact our fortunes dramatically nor were we (severely) persecuted for our beliefs – religious, political or others. And, blame it on this upbringing, there was no big or immediate need to challenge or change the ways of society. If anything, excellence in education was the mechanism to fight any injustice or societal challenges. The road to success was paved with degrees.

The reason for the preceding self-righteous paragraphs is to provide some background on my cultural conditioning and how I’m likely to approach the JNU situation. And mind you education is an ongoing process, much of which happens in the University of Life where new classes begin pretty much every minute. This impacts the evolution of my mind, constantly changing my views with passing time, which I hope only improves me as a person.

With that out of the way, I realize that people are different and that there are sections of people that, quite rightfully, feel the need to change or fight certain societal constructs and norms that have and can truly hold them back from coming up in life. In a country like India, there is never a shortage of such issues to espouse and champion. And educational institutions are often the first places where the oppressed can voice their opinions and bring attention to their causes. And why not? After all, universities should be seats of learning and the ultimate proving grounds for creative ideas, bold thoughts and dynamic leaders. The confluence of young minds from all levels of society, differing viewpoints and plurality of opinions, glued together by a common purpose should remain an exciting place to be a part of.

I’m also aware that there is a world outside of technical/engineering education with concepts and theories which are characterized by shades of grey rather than black and white interpretations. Interpretation is left to the individual and no one is either wrong or right. And debates and arguments are critical learning tools. And I seriously subscribe to the view that challenging existing, accepted practices and philosophies – as an academic exercise – should be actively encouraged.

In this milieu what happened at JNU (and I’m relying on reading up on a non-trivial sample of mainstream media articles) somehow doesn’t go down well with my sense of right and wrong. I believe that on the 9^th of February, a line was crossed. A line that separated earnest learning, pushing academic boundaries and genuine curiosity from and I hate to use these words, mischief, malice and misguided activism. And I'm going to avoid raising questions like how do these "students" find the time for such activism? Or why do the JNU students seem to take such a long time to wrap up their studies and move on? They are for some other day. 

I don’t know what nationalism is. I’m not intellectually honed enough to even attempt a definition. As a concept, it is abstract, vague and prone to individual interpretation(s).  But I suppose it has something to do with that feeling that takes shape in the chest whenever the national anthem is played. Or with that lump in the throat when a widow turns up to collect a posthumous award for her husband’s bravery in a far away battlefield. Something also about the belief that the land that we call home will protect and in turn, will be protected. It has something to do with that invisible yet tangible feeling that glues together India with all its warts. From paying the taxes to casting our votes to a belief in our (slow and sometimes flawed) systems and everything they encompass. A general instinct, honed on human evolution that can discern what is good to the land from what is not.

Afzal Guru, if one were to conduct a snap poll across the living rooms of homes in India, I suspect, would be overwhelmingly characterized as a terrorist with a clean conscience. Ditto Ajmal Kasab and Yakoob Memon. One could be the intellectual equivalent of Lenin, Mao and Che Guevara rolled into one. But that ceases to matter once they start blowing up people. So questioning their execution, please don’t call it judicial killing or some such shit, when done under the garb of liberalism or whatever-it-is-ism doesn’t quite ring as an academic exercise. An evening of calling for the nation’s destruction – the very nation that is bankrolling the university – masquerading as a poetry reading event is bound to stir passions and leave a nation stewing in righteous anger. I will call for the country’s destruction on the one hand and will still enjoy an education that is subsidized by its tax payers is, quite simply, hypocrisy. One doesn’t even have to invoke the “US university, Osama BL support” analogy here to come to this conclusion. And for dessert, a classic round of illogical Hindu-God-bashing in the name of liberal thinking to top off your education; knowing pretty well that no hands will be chopped nor people hacked to death or police stations set aflame for “blasphemy.” When it is Hinduism, alternate interpretations, misrepresentation and willful slander is fair game. I won’t resort to the “Let them go to Pakistan” solution. But honestly, if they nurse such mistrust and hatred towards the nation and Hinduism, perhaps, in their interest, India isn’t where they should be.

One has got to agree with what has been rightly pointed out in many places: thoughts cannot be policed nor can everyone be forced to follow a particular definition of nationalism or patriotism. But in the same breath, there is no denying that words bridge thoughts and actions. I don’t for a moment believe that any of the students involved in this fracas are anywhere close to kicking off a revolution or can manage to break up India in this age of better awareness and access to multiple narratives. But there is no denying that such activities could potentially lead to persistent, low intensity type nuisance and may create many rebels with no worthwhile cause. And that is a strain that the already beleaguered system funded by productive, law abiding, tax payers can do without.

I must hasten to add that I don’t have a problem with the humanities stream at large or JNU as an institution. What bothers me is any education infused with leftist ideals and leftist ideals only and with a dusting of Marx’s beard trimmings. When such education tinged with failed thoughts begins to bias your thinking, trouble begins to brew. The study of communism, I wish I’m proven wrong, is not unlike waltzing with a corpse. Humans take what suits them and leave out what doesn’t. In that sense, it is a dead philosophy based on the number of “truly communist” states around today. So exhuming it from the depths, embracing its ancient successes – few and far apart, forgetting its massive failures and celebrating its non-existent relevance is an exercise in futility. If you were an investor, would you sink your money in a fresh “the-earth-is-flat” project knowing what we know today? Communism and its cousins should be treated as relics from the past that humans have managed to evolve out of. Any study of the dead, left philosophies should thus be tempered with the emphasis on vowing to not allow the mistakes to happen again. And while I’m at it, I wish a stint at JNU or elsewhere will also impart the lesson to the sloganeers that “anti-establishment” activism is useless unless it throws up a workable alternative or corrective measures. If every idiot with a grudge against India felt that separatism is the way out, we would be a million different states.

This rant wouldn’t be complete without doffing the hat, first at the media and at our politicians. Journalism is meant to hold up a mirror and not a placard. It is such a shame when journalists start playing jurors, judges and executioners. In India, opposition has morphed into the opposites and their members into ambulance chasing, professional fasters-for-hire. A certain government hangs the terrorist Afzal Guru, a group of students then oppose it today and the representatives of that same government show solidarity with them. If the journos were busy making left turns, the opposition politicians were busy making U-turns. And one of them, the ex-Home Minister no less, goes so far as to raise doubts on the validity of the judgment to hang Afzal. What is walking all over oneself if it means a few more votes? I have one comment for this bunch of intellectuals: your throats will be the first ones to be slit if the Afzals and Ajmals have a free run.

What really churned my stomach while all this was happening was the stark contrast provided by the avalanche in Siachen that claimed the lives of ten soldiers who were guarding the nation against the likes of Afzal Gurus, Ajmal Kasabs and Yakoob Memons. They walked the talk of being ready to lay down their lives only so that we can have enough freedom to question the very foundations of our country. I’m sure they had their own grudges, disappointments and issues with the idea of India but we should be glad that they never let that come in the way of duty to the nation. At the end of the day, this is not about student activism, earning degrees or playing dirty politics. This is about us, as a nation, looking Mahadevi in the eye and assuring her that her husband Hanumanthappa’s death was not in vain.