Posted:
Ok so I'm back for some time.
Umar Khalid is not a terrorist. He is a PhD student. By that logic, so many humanities PhD students should be jailed. This is what students of humanities do - they question government and legal decisions by studying, analysing and interpreting legal judgements and administrative documents.
You can disagree with his opinion and his interpretation. So make a counter argument. Offer a different interpretation of the same material. You cannot jail him for having an opinion that is different to yours, no matter how repulsive that opinion may seem to you. It is not sedition or anti-national to question the nation-state.
If you google the Indian map in India, google maps shows Kashmir as part of India. If you google it in Pakistan, they show it as part of Pakistan. If you google it in a third country like America or Australia, it shows the territory as disputed. How come these nationalists are not at the google office, demanding that they show only one map with Kashmir as part of India? Why do they accept Americans calling the territory occupied (as the UN and the American government does) but not other Indian people who may be speaking within an academic context?
Umar Khaled was cut off in the Times Now debate when Arnab started speaking and refused to let him finish. As for the slogans, yes, there was a rally at the JNU campus and a fight broke out between two groups of students - one, the ABVP and two, students organising a public rally about Kashmir. So far, in this country, you can organise a public rally about any issue, so they were not breaking any law in organising one. Both sides shouted slogans. The president of the JNU students union came to calm the situation down. The transcript of his speech is freely available. He did not raise any anti-India slogans, in fact his speech begins by him declaring that he has full faith in the constitution of India and that these problems can be solved.
Times Now showed a video given to them by the BJP spokesperson. The video is doctored. It takes slogans that Kanhaiya made in a different speech - where he said "azaadi lekar rahenge - azadi bhookh se, jaatiwaad se, striyon par atyachar se" - and put it together with the footage of that night. Two news channels have proved that this video is doctored. Arnab himself first said they never aired the video, then took it back to say that they did say that the video was unverified. In fact, it was one of the guests on his panel who pointed out that the video was unverified, not him.
So this is the situation on the ground. A man who did not raise the slogans in question has been arrested. All those who respect the courts of India are not actually waiting for the court to decided whether he is guilty or innocent - he has been beaten up twice while the police watched and did nothing. Police raid JNU hostels regularly and male police inspectors walk into girls hostels without warning. The students and teachers of JNU have been marching and protesting every single day, and holding open air classes. They are very specifically asking for: a) the release of the union president b) stop the witch hunt and calling students anti-nationa; and c)remove police from the JNU campus. Nowhere have they said that they do not want to fly the national flag on JNU. Arnab is now bringing this up to get TRPs as save himself since he has very obviously been involved in provoking popular opinion and inciting a lynching mob.
The definition of hate speech is speech that is calculated to evoke violence. Four slogans of JNU students are not as much of hate speech as what Arnab has done, shouting down other people and saying on tv "you are anti-national". Today it has happened to an academic. Tomorrow a person eating beef/marrying a Muslim could be accused of the same thing if it suits Arnab.
Finally, you can call me all the names you want. You can call this story fabricated. Both points of views are easily available online. Believe what you will.
PS: I am not a JNU student or teacher. I am an academic with lots of friends across many different colleges and universities in Delhi. I'm not basing this on one news reporter but on many different news reports, on accounts of people who were actually there and from both sides of the ideological border. Just yesterday 3 ABVP students have also resigned because while they may disagree with the left on a variety of things, they understood that the media and politicians are using this issue to create hatred for JNU.
All things Korean
Ganesh Kartikeya
Anupamaa
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