Way back in 1956, in the first convocation address of India's very first Indian Institute of Technology in Kharagpur, West Bengal, India's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru called it a "fine monument of India, representing India's urges, India's future in the making". He went on to say that it seemed to him "symbolical of the changes that [were] coming to India". Almost six decades later, the IITs stand tall as institutes of national importance that have given the country thousands of engineering graduates who follow diverse career paths, ranging from the likes of novelist Chetan Bhagat to the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
Over the years, the institutes have not only produced quality engineers but also successful entrepreneurs, authors, scientists and even politicians. However, lately, many IITs have been making news for reasons more closely related to political thought, activism and a clash of ideologies than engineering.
What has changed?
The recent controversy at IIT-Madras over the ban of an independent discussion forum, and the protests that followed nationwide, holds some indicators as to why students at other premier institutes felt compelled to start similar groups in their campuses as well, as a mark of solidarity. This also provides a clue about a new dimension of student activism where any restriction on their freedom of expression is intolerable.
One of the major reasons for the recent upheavals at the IITs is because of increase in the attempts by the authorities to curb freedom of speech of students, according to Rahul Maganti, a mechanical engineer and one of the people behind Progressive and Democratic Students’ Collective at the IIT Bombay.
The collective has played an important role of an ideological catalyst at the institution by organising lectures and talks on issues of socio economic importance as regularly as it has come out and supported liberties of people through protests ranging from the “kiss of love” to film screenings on gay rights and workers’ movements.
In the face of turmoil at the IIT-Madras, the students of IIT-Bombay not only went out to protest on the road but they also established their own Ambedkar Periyar Phule Study Circle as a mark of solidarity. The time also proved opportune for students at the institution to announce a two-day summit to be held this week with activists from other IITs and discuss the future of democratic movements such as their own in campuses across India.
Does this mean that the government is out to attack IITs and students are merely responding? Many disagree. “The governments of the past have been no better or worse than the current one for the freedom of speech in the country,” said a student from IIT Madras, requesting anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue on his campus. “It’s the administration that always ends up pleading allegiance to the current ruling outfit and ends up suppressing voices of dissent. It has happened before and it will happen in the future. But what helps voices such as ours is social media’s assistance in garnering support and yet staying faceless among the crowd when anonymity is warranted for academic future.”
Identity crises
It’s not just the power of the social media that is fuelling the activism on IIT campuses. It's also a sense of belonging and identification with those against whom the authorities seem to have been high-handed. The desire to organise and demonstrate also gets an impetus from the lead taken by other universities – in this case, Jadavpur and Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi set worthy examples to follow.
A student at IIT-Delhi explained the need. “When a few students among us tried to organise ourselves into a sexuality and gender diversity group, they faced a lot of pushback from the authorities,” he said. Another teacher speaking on condition of anonymity from the institution confirmed the incident and added that “the group has been reduced to a Facebook page.”
What could be the reason for such resistance? “IITs are considered technical education institutions and not chambers of politics,” she said. “They are all scared of anything related to politics.”
An ex-student from the institute, who worked as a volunteer with the Aam Aadmi Party only to get disillusioned with the outfit in a few months, feels that the academic life is not enriching enough for the students and the campus cannot be kept immune from politics. “Even though all political parties seem evil twins of each other, political ideologies still need to be articulated and debated,” he said. “Engaging with political thought or standing up for someone’s rights won’t make us politicians.”
But not everyone agrees. A masters student from IIT Guwhati said that the campus remains apolitical as ever and all activism happens outside it. “There’s not enough interest for activism here,” she said. “I don’t think there are any political groups here because everyone just wants to be a great engineer.”
At the same time, those inclined towards activism feel that it’s only a matter of time before other institutions become participants too. “It is empowering and certainly necessary to speak up when you are being governed by the political class,” said Rahul Maganti from IIT-Bombay. “If politics is determining our course, our stipends and our future, then we need to ask for redressal whenever required. There are many who want to be the crowd instead of the leaders, so the only requirement is of someone who can lead these movements in campuses,” he said.
Trigger warning
Arguing for the students' right to dissent, Hartosh Singh Bal wrote in Caravan that they are often treated as "technicians" more than anything else. "Our republic has ensured that the IITs supply a steady stream of technicians – engineers and managers – but very few who are truly creative. We must understand that even technological advances are creative acts and do not originate from those who have settled for the work of a technician," he wrote, adding that we value technicians more than creative people.
"Under extreme conditions, pure mathematics may be a refuge for people denied a say in political life – as was the case in the Soviet Union, but most of them were only awaiting a chance to flee a society they had no sympathy for."
While Maganti feels that it’s natural for political thought to grow and it will, many on his campus expressed the view that it’s the current government’s policies which have prompted those leaning towards the Left to take up issues and question them.
“It’s never easy to express dissent," said a student from the graduating batch at IIT-B, "But the current government seems much more intolerant to critique than the previous others.” And it is not a party-political line that they want to blindly toe. “We want to critique policies objectively instead of subscribing to any political ideology and just disseminate the information of what’s happening on ground and how different it is from what’s being reported by the papers.”
An ex-student from IIT Kharagpur felt that it is up to the campus to allow or suppress dissent and activism but issues often brew from inside. “People feel affected by things around them and then they want to speak up,” she said. “We can launch collective after collective to critique the government, but if nobody feels for it then there’s no point. The idea of a collective is to bring social change no matter how small scale that is in the beginning.”
“We can’t cry foul all the time and resort to activism just to heckle,” she said. “As engineers, we should solve the nation’s problems instead.”
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Over the years, the institutes have not only produced quality engineers but also successful entrepreneurs, authors, scientists and even politicians. However, lately, many IITs have been making news for reasons more closely related to political thought, activism and a clash of ideologies than engineering.
What has changed?
The recent controversy at IIT-Madras over the ban of an independent discussion forum, and the protests that followed nationwide, holds some indicators as to why students at other premier institutes felt compelled to start similar groups in their campuses as well, as a mark of solidarity. This also provides a clue about a new dimension of student activism where any restriction on their freedom of expression is intolerable.
One of the major reasons for the recent upheavals at the IITs is because of increase in the attempts by the authorities to curb freedom of speech of students, according to Rahul Maganti, a mechanical engineer and one of the people behind Progressive and Democratic Students’ Collective at the IIT Bombay.
The collective has played an important role of an ideological catalyst at the institution by organising lectures and talks on issues of socio economic importance as regularly as it has come out and supported liberties of people through protests ranging from the “kiss of love” to film screenings on gay rights and workers’ movements.
In the face of turmoil at the IIT-Madras, the students of IIT-Bombay not only went out to protest on the road but they also established their own Ambedkar Periyar Phule Study Circle as a mark of solidarity. The time also proved opportune for students at the institution to announce a two-day summit to be held this week with activists from other IITs and discuss the future of democratic movements such as their own in campuses across India.
Does this mean that the government is out to attack IITs and students are merely responding? Many disagree. “The governments of the past have been no better or worse than the current one for the freedom of speech in the country,” said a student from IIT Madras, requesting anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue on his campus. “It’s the administration that always ends up pleading allegiance to the current ruling outfit and ends up suppressing voices of dissent. It has happened before and it will happen in the future. But what helps voices such as ours is social media’s assistance in garnering support and yet staying faceless among the crowd when anonymity is warranted for academic future.”
Identity crises
It’s not just the power of the social media that is fuelling the activism on IIT campuses. It's also a sense of belonging and identification with those against whom the authorities seem to have been high-handed. The desire to organise and demonstrate also gets an impetus from the lead taken by other universities – in this case, Jadavpur and Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi set worthy examples to follow.
A student at IIT-Delhi explained the need. “When a few students among us tried to organise ourselves into a sexuality and gender diversity group, they faced a lot of pushback from the authorities,” he said. Another teacher speaking on condition of anonymity from the institution confirmed the incident and added that “the group has been reduced to a Facebook page.”
What could be the reason for such resistance? “IITs are considered technical education institutions and not chambers of politics,” she said. “They are all scared of anything related to politics.”
An ex-student from the institute, who worked as a volunteer with the Aam Aadmi Party only to get disillusioned with the outfit in a few months, feels that the academic life is not enriching enough for the students and the campus cannot be kept immune from politics. “Even though all political parties seem evil twins of each other, political ideologies still need to be articulated and debated,” he said. “Engaging with political thought or standing up for someone’s rights won’t make us politicians.”
But not everyone agrees. A masters student from IIT Guwhati said that the campus remains apolitical as ever and all activism happens outside it. “There’s not enough interest for activism here,” she said. “I don’t think there are any political groups here because everyone just wants to be a great engineer.”
At the same time, those inclined towards activism feel that it’s only a matter of time before other institutions become participants too. “It is empowering and certainly necessary to speak up when you are being governed by the political class,” said Rahul Maganti from IIT-Bombay. “If politics is determining our course, our stipends and our future, then we need to ask for redressal whenever required. There are many who want to be the crowd instead of the leaders, so the only requirement is of someone who can lead these movements in campuses,” he said.
Trigger warning
Arguing for the students' right to dissent, Hartosh Singh Bal wrote in Caravan that they are often treated as "technicians" more than anything else. "Our republic has ensured that the IITs supply a steady stream of technicians – engineers and managers – but very few who are truly creative. We must understand that even technological advances are creative acts and do not originate from those who have settled for the work of a technician," he wrote, adding that we value technicians more than creative people.
"Under extreme conditions, pure mathematics may be a refuge for people denied a say in political life – as was the case in the Soviet Union, but most of them were only awaiting a chance to flee a society they had no sympathy for."
While Maganti feels that it’s natural for political thought to grow and it will, many on his campus expressed the view that it’s the current government’s policies which have prompted those leaning towards the Left to take up issues and question them.
“It’s never easy to express dissent," said a student from the graduating batch at IIT-B, "But the current government seems much more intolerant to critique than the previous others.” And it is not a party-political line that they want to blindly toe. “We want to critique policies objectively instead of subscribing to any political ideology and just disseminate the information of what’s happening on ground and how different it is from what’s being reported by the papers.”
An ex-student from IIT Kharagpur felt that it is up to the campus to allow or suppress dissent and activism but issues often brew from inside. “People feel affected by things around them and then they want to speak up,” she said. “We can launch collective after collective to critique the government, but if nobody feels for it then there’s no point. The idea of a collective is to bring social change no matter how small scale that is in the beginning.”
“We can’t cry foul all the time and resort to activism just to heckle,” she said. “As engineers, we should solve the nation’s problems instead.”
