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  This is what happened when Rohith Vemula, a twenty-five year old PhD scholar at the University of Hyderabad, took his own life after leaving a touching suicide note. Suicides can partly be linked to one’s specific personality and mental makeup. However, some of it can—and in this case is—linked to the world around the person.

  While Rohith’s note blames no one for his death, he does mention his agony over being ostracised (he was suspended and asked to leave the hostel along with a few others), denied his due (his fellowship was delayed, causing financial hardship), and discriminated against.

  A particular chain of events seems to have culminated in his suicide. Rohith was involved in student politics. Apparently, he joined protests against Yakub Memon’s hanging. During those protests, he had run-ins with ABVP students, who are backed by the BJP. An ABVP activist claimed that he was manhandled by Rohith and others, and a complaint was lodged. While such events are unsavoury, they are not unusual in Indian campuses, many of which are politically charged.

  However, what happened next was unusual. The local MP, along with Union Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya, wrote a letter to HRD minister Smriti Irani, alleging that the university had become a ‘den of casteist, extremist and anti-national politics’. The HRD ministry wrote to the university vice-chancellor, seeking to know what action was being taken.

  Eventually, five students including Rohith were suspended and denied hostel accommodation. They camped outside the campus gates in a tent in protest. Rohith, unfortunately, committed suicide after a few days.

  There is a clear conflict of interest when an ABVP complaint gets so much attention from two BJP-run Union ministries, which in turn can easily put pressure on the university to clamp down.

  Meanwhile, politicians of all shades descended on the University of Hyderabad campus, particularly those that sought Dalit votes. I don’t know what is sadder, a young man killing himself, or politicians flocking to the venue to increase their vote banks. This drama of blame-game politics on the issue will continue.

  What we should focus on instead is deriving lessons from the incident. There are serious issues in the way we manage our universities, and it needs to be understood that Rohith’s suicide is a horrible outcome of such mismanagement.

  The single biggest issue confronting government universities is the level of autonomy the government gives to the university management. These institutions are run on taxpayer money, so clearly the government cannot take a completely hands-off approach. At the same time, should there be letters from Union ministries enquiring about specific cases involving students?

  Should student discipline be a university issue, a local MP issue, a police issue or a Union ministry issue? Should government colleges even allow student politics on campus? Wouldn’t campus politics create conflicts of interest and place students at risk, especially if they don’t belong to the party that forms the government?

  We don’t know yet if the suspended students deserved punishment or not. However, who should be making this decision? If it is the university, should MPs be writing letters to ministers to take action, or equally bad, politicians from opposing sides descend on the university campus to decry the action? Why are we turning our universities into a joke? Isn’t there enough silly politics around anyway?

  Autonomy is the heart of the issue here, if not the only one. There are other aspects of the case that need to be discussed too. Why are government payments delayed so often? The university claims that Rohith’s fellowship was delayed due to administrative issues and not out of vindictiveness. Even if one believes this, why are student stipends withheld for months at a time? Rohith’s suicide note states that financial difficulties were a big factor in his taking his life.

  Another issue is Rohith’s presumed identity as a Dalit, and the discrimination Dalit students face on campus. It is a deplorable but unfortunate reality in a system where merit is given a backseat to identity. If we didn’t have caste-based reservations, caste wouldn’t be so relevant on campus. It would soon become a non-issue. If we can shift to an economic criteria for reservation rather than a caste-based one (today, we have the technology to do this), we can reduce the stigma associated with caste.

  Unfortunately, caste reservations—the very scheme that was designed to make people more equal—has become the biggest cause of discrimination on every campus. It happened during my days at IIT, and it happens in every university with reservation today. Can’t we switch to better admission criteria?

  Politicians posturing and blaming each other on TV will achieve nothing. A genuine tribute to Rohith would be to learn the right lessons from his suicide. We need to make changes in the way we manage and run our universities. We also need to free our universities of caste and politics. Let’s do it sooner rather than later, to prevent more cases like Rohith’s in the future.

  Indian Institute of Autonomy: Don’t Kill a Model that Works

  To create and sustain world-class institutes of higher learning, maintain a balance between state control and institutional autonomy

  I was once invited to join a panel discussion at a conference of vice-chancellors held at Rashtrapati Bhavan. To give credit where it is due, it was a well-organised and well-intentioned event. Nearly a hundred VCs of top central universities across India attended the conference.

  The attendees, divided into several sub-groups, discussed the burning issues faced by the education sector today. Although the format of the meet was a tad too formal and colonial in protocol, the ideas were all current and relevant. The need to integrate industry-research-academia, using technology more effectively, driving innovation and entrepreneurship, tapping alumni bases, inter-university collaboration, and network connectivity—all these wonderful thoughts were discussed. Hence, the theory that the heads of our educational institutions are outdated and don’t know what’s going on in the world, was disproved.

  And yet, few would disagree that there is plenty that needs to be done in the education sector.

  If everyone in the country agrees on the wonderful ideas discussed in the conference, why doesn’t it happen? Why isn’t there more industry–university interaction, for instance? Why do we fall behind in cutting-edge research? Why don’t we have more A-grade institutions? Why are the education brands created in the ’60s and ’70s—the IITs, IIMs, AIIMS, some Delhi University colleges and a couple of other places—the only reputed institutions in the country to date? Why haven’t we created new brands in education, at par with IITs and the IIMs, in the ’80s, the ’90s or the new millennium?

  The answer lies in our inability to manage an extraordinarily important issue affecting every state-owned institution in India—the question of autonomy. No matter how vocal and well-versed the academic heads were in that conference, the fact of the matter is that they won’t be able to implement even 10 per cent of their ideas because their hands are tied. In India, the state funds the university and, hence, controls it. For our universities to thrive, the extent of control and the level of autonomy need to find an optimal balance.

  For the IITs and the IIMs, the control–autonomy balance seems to have worked better than for the others. As a result, they could adapt better to changing times, attract top talent and maintain high standards of excellence over time. Small wonder, then, that their brand value exceeds that of the other institutes.

  Of course, even IIMs are not immune to interference from the government. The new IIM bill of 2015, purportedly designed to make them statutory institutions so they can issue degrees instead of diplomas (a technicality for all practical purposes), is going to dramatically reduce the delicate autonomy balance that has helped the IIMs thrive.

  To its credit, the government did place the draft bill for public consultation (on mygov.in). However, the proposed version is worded in a way that government approval will be required for almost all operations that matter—recruitment, enrolment, compensation and research. Needless to say, it will drastically reduce the autonomy of the I