Emotions Run High Over Dalit Student’s Suicide at Hyderabad Univ

A suspension, a probe and an expulsion have now led to a suicide and protests at the University of Hyderabad.

Sequence of Events

• ABVP disrupts screening of documentary on 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots at DU, allegedly for being ‘anti-Hindu’, on 1 August 2015.
• Ambedkar Students’ Association (ASA) holds a small protest against disruption two days later.
• ABVP President puts up Facebook post hurting ASA Students’ sentiments.
• Small, non-violent confrontation reportedly occurs.
• ABVP President tenders apology letter in presence of security.
• ABVP President along with his brother, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha, goes to private hospital and says he was assaulted by the ASA.
• BJP MLC Ramachandra Rao meets Vice-Chancellor insisting on action against ‘Dalits’, terming them as ‘anti-national.’
  
• Enquiry committee formed under the chairmanship of Professor Alok Pandey.
  
• Students claim committee findings are contradictory.
• Five Dalit students are suspended.
• Rohith Vemula, one of the suspended students, commits suicide on January 17, leaving a suicide note.
• Students sit with Vemula’s body and hold demonstrations demanding filing of case under SC/ST Atrocity Act against Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya.
• Police forcibly shift body from university campus to Osmania government hospital.
  
• Eight students arrested.
• Smriti Irani, Minister of Human Resource Development sends a team.

The suspension of five Dalit research scholars from the University of Hyderabad took a tragic turn on Sunday when one of them committed suicide.

Rohith Vemula hanged himself in a hostel room on Sunday evening, police said. The 28-year-old, hailing from the Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, was a second-year PhD student.

He was from Guntur and was a second year research scholar. He committed suicide in his friend Uma Maheswar’s room. He died roughly around 6 pm,” S Munna, co-convenor of the ASA in UoH told The News Minute.

CV Anand, Cyberabad Police Commissioner

Rohith was one of the five Dalit scholars suspended by the university last year, after he was involved in a verbal clash between two student groups. He was associated with the Ambedkar Students’ Association (ASA).

Rohith and four other research scholars were suspended from the university following a clash with leaders of right-wing student group Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

The entire chain of incidents can be traced back to August 1, when the ABVP disrupted the screening of a documentary on the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots at Delhi University, allegedly for being ‘anti-Hindu’.

The ASA held a small protest against the disruption on August 3, following which the university’s ABVP president put up a Facebook post which hurt our sentiments, as he called us goons.

One of the suspended students had earlier told The News Minute

The ASA students claim that a small, non-violent confrontation followed, with the ABVP President tendering an apology letter in the presence of security, and everyone is said to have returned.

The Proctorial Board, the disciplinary authority of the institute, conducted a probe into the incident. The committee was constituted after an ABVP activist was allegedly attacked on the campus.

Meanwhile, the five students had been suspended. The committee, in its final decision recommended that the five research scholars be expelled from the hostel. The students claim that the findings of the committee and the decision to expel them were contradictory.

The suspended scholars had approached the high court against the expulsion. S Munna, one of the suspended scholars, had said that they come from poor families and cannot afford to stay outside by paying rent. The expulsion forced them to sleep in a makeshift tent on campus.

Terming the suicide a murder by right-wing groups, Dalit and leftist student groups called for the closure of educational institutions in Telangana on Monday.

When contacted by The Times of India, Appa Rao Podile, the vice-chancellor said,

I am shocked over the extreme step taken by the scholar. I did speak to the scholars a few days back on this issue. However, I had no clue that he will take such a step.

Posted by ASA - HCU on Sunday, December 20, 2015

The suspended students and their supporters had been staging protests on the campus since the suicide. The students, under the umbrella of a Joint Action Committee, termed the suspension as “undemocratic”, “social boycott” and “inhuman”.

The scholars had also alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party mounted on the university authorities to take action against the Dalit students who belong to the Ambedkar Students Association.

They cited that Union Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya, who is a Member of the Lok Sabha from Secunderabad, had written to Union Human Resources Development Minister Smriti Irani, seeking action for “changing the campus for the better”.

(With inputs from IANS and The News Minute)