Non-serious students get into political movements
Dec. 17: The recent political agitations in the state, be it for a separate Telangana or a unified Andhra, have raised some questions about the involvement of students in political activism.
For instance, why have only the conventional universities become the hub of political activity? Why have students in technical and other specialised universities stayed away from the agitations?
When Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) chief, Mr K. Chandrasekhar Rao was arrested to prevent him from sitting on a fast-unto-death, only the Osmania University students reacted. Later, the agitation spread to other conventional universities like Palamur, Nalgonda, Telangana and Kakatiya universities.
However, students in other major universities in the city such as the JNTU-Kukatpally, JNTU-Masab Tank, English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad Central University, Acharya NG Ranga Agriculture University and the Maulana Azad National Urdu University remained entirely peaceful.
Why this sharp contrast in the attitude of students belonging to different universities located in the same region?
“The answer is simple,” says Mr D.N. Reddy, the vice-chancellor of JNTU-Kukatpally. “The conventional universities have limited employment opportunities for students compared to specialised universities. So students in the former are not as career-oriented. Moreover, political parties have a strong organisational base in these campuses that were built over decades on the basis of politics, region and caste.”
Professor P. Ramakrishna Rao, the former dean of REC Trichy and ANITS of Visakhapatnam, said, “Generally, students with an academic bent of mind have a thoroughly professional attitude and keep away from politics. They crave recognition within their sphere and not outside.”
Moreover, students in conventional universities tend to think that campuses are stepping stones to a bright political career.
“There are several instances in the past where students, who actively took part in political activities on campus, went on to become top political leaders. For example, Mr Chandrababu Naidu and Mr Venkaiah Naidu actively took part in the Jai Andhra movement. Students in the OU involved in the 1969 Telangana movement like Mr Jaipal Reddy and Mr Mallikarjun have risen to national level. Even the present state ministers, Mr Sridhar Babu, Mr Mukesh Goud, Mr D. Rajanarasimha and Karimnagar MP Ponnam Prabhakar are from OU and were associated with student agitations,” said a professor who did not want to be named.
Moreover, it’s easy for political parties to muster support of students on university campuses.
“Though we have a large number of colleges and other educational institutions, it is not easy for political parties to spread their base there because they are scattered and located in different areas and work only from 10 am to 4 pm. After classes, their students disperse. But at a university campus thousands of students reside in one place and are available round the clock. It’s easy to spread ideologies. That’s why we see agitations or political activity only on campuses and not in other educational institutions,” said Ms Meenakshi, a senior professor.
Latest Comments
I think the OU students who participate in these agitations are just a failure in studies. They remain in the university for years enjoying the university benefits, teasing the girls around. I grew up in a area which is very close to OU campus and I have friends who studied in OU who have the same opinion.
Sonia, 'You think' and so you are... well, you are whatever your convoluted, subservient, paraochial and insecure thoughts make you out to me. I studied in OU and I am a chief engineer in a large hitech company and...ahem..I do quite well for myself. and I am from Telangana and took part in quite a few protests..and never ever teased a girl. And as one from ground zero, let me tell you - you and your friends are full of it. and how!
My advice (and yes, that's another thing that these protestrs can do) - Take it easy. concentrate on your studies and this time, make sure that your future in a country like India is not dictated and limited by which language or dialect you speak. And for God's sake stand up for your rights if you have to - just like the protesters you talked about.
And even if you and peoplr like you were right and these were OU squatters, it still does not take away from the right to demonstrate and demand what they want.
When our sorry darn mess of a state was formed because someone somewhere died while fasting - for something he believed in and many did not - it's not incorrect to have some correction in the present using the same tactics.
I think you are one of those maoists in the campus. You should be banned from the company in which you are working. Iam also a ou student and what sonia is saying is absolutely true.
Yeah, Yeah.. and nitwits and psuedo intellectuals like those who have commented here rule the roost. Non-serious students! What a term! So anyone who is interested in participating in politics as a future is non-serious - haha. One of the reasons why this state or for that matter Telangana sucks is because of idiotic thinkers like this.
Students are the ones with most vested in the future of the state and country - something so profound as a state formation, safegauarding their future is something worth fighting about and they should.
The self-serving, boring fellows who commented earlier are basically saying that we should listen or react only to non-students - and these are the people who have already pushed back our development back by a few decades, divided as they are by caste, religion, language, dialect and more.
Students should be part of the political movement. Of course, respecting public property is part of everyone's civic duty. The politicians should start off by rolemodelling this. Stop burning buses when someone's father dies and their sons are not made CMs, stop stopping trains whenever you want to get your point across and stop saying that someone who died of kidney failure dies because he could not bear the thought of some leader dying and stop grabbing waqf and other public property.
It is a bitter truth which again will not be accepted. The inferiority of the less educated, lumpens would be translated as the exploitation of more educated and they would be brainwashed to give an impression that if all the so called outsiders leave, the jobs are yours. Similar to reserved category jobs. They are up for grab but will not get filled because of no basic skills. This again will be used to do more brainwash saying that inspite of equality you are exploited. This goes one.
In these days of equal opportunities, how can anyone be prevented in the name of state, region etc? If so, How can so called exploited, underprivileged telanganites go and work in USA dominated by settler Andhraites? But unfortunately, people will see no reason.
There is some truth to the assertion in the article. Majority of the students who attend professional colleges in the universities don't usually have time for these kinds of things. They are too busy with their coursework and career in private sector etc. They usually come out for agitation only if something would affect them directly like the anti-reservation agitation of 80’s.
It is the students of colleges who are mediocre and do not have good prospects in private sector are the ones who look for public sector jobs. And agitations like these which give some hope to them that "kick these other guys who are not like you and me out of our region" and we'll get to keep these jobs all for ourselves is a strong motivating factor.
I know, this is very loaded statement but I will say it anyway, I noticed that its easier to brainwash educationally disadvantaged groups as well as economically disadvantaged groups with ideologies. It is for this reason, you will see most of the suicides come for not well to do students. It saddens me to see the very younglings who should be the beacon for the poor family and take care of them, just giving that up for some selfish politician, who for all you know wouldn’t even remember that victims name in six months time.
More from Hyderabad
Post your comment