Sikkim University appears to have completely lost the plot on its role and responsibilities. Its establishment by an Act of Parliament, as the management at the University underlines in every banner it prints, was not to impose ideas, but to deliver higher education to free the minds of the students, assist quality research and encourage academic ambition. Of course, there are more roles that the University is expected to essay, but fact remains that every single one of them has to be in the service of students.
There cannot be anything more important than students for the institution, but there have been constant rumblings of how students at SU rarely receive the consideration they deserve. Even as one overlooked these complaints in the past and excused the administration because the institution was still young, the Vice Chancellor, by referring to students who had demonstrated outside the administrative block on Friday as “educated illiterates”, exposed the disturbing attitudes which are calling the shots at the University. The VC made this equation in his closing remarks at the plenary session of the first meeting of the new Academic Council on Saturday. It would have been disconcerting enough if such comments were passed by University officials in private conversations, but for it to have been made in an open session to members of the new Academic Council is downright reprehensible. The University has been instituted to service students and it can be of no service to anyone if it looks down on them and dismisses their demands with such vitriol – irrespective of whether the demands are genuine or ill-informed or even instigated – without engaging them in earnest deliberations. Far from engaging the students, the University dodged their charter of demands with a disinterestedly drafted response and has now discarded them as “educated illiterates”. One normally expects erudition to deliver mature responses and equip individuals with a deeper sense of responsibility and empathy. It is obvious that these virtues have been exchanged for egotistic superciliousness at Sikkim University. And the latest shocker is not even an aberration. The University has already gone out of its way to harass students who found a voice and chose to express themselves. For some inexplicable reason, all these slights have been allowed to pass without comment by the civil society here. And now, after five years of deciding how higher education should be dispensed in Sikkim, comes the announcement of how the VC regards the students – with disdain. While it would be of no consequence if people unrelated to education or the students held such opinions about college students here, it is scandalous for the VC to not only believe so, but also publicly announce it. It is disturbing because it reveals that students can expect no compassion or tolerance from the SU management; they might be thrown crumbs of charity and pretentious condescension when they are “good”, but should they speak up or disagree, they become “educated illiterates”.
There will be those who will dismiss the student protest as being politically motivated/ instigated, but in believing so, they will be reinforcing the branding the VC has cast on them now. Faced with a management which obviously has no interest in engaging them, is someone suggesting that the students should have been extended no support? Those who were at the spot on Friday attest that the students blocked the highway only when they could neither meet the VC nor find anyone in the University’s administrative block willing to address their demands. Is someone suggesting that the police should have used force to clear the road? Can the frustration of college students be dismissed as a protest by “educated illiterates”?
I think the editorial has got it quite right. Even if the VC was frustrated by the turn of events it would have served him better if he had kept his trap shut in a public event. By using the unfortunate oxymoron 'educated illiterates' for a group of students engaged in the healthy act of dissent (let us give these poor fools the benefit of the doubt), he has joined the West Bengal CM who walked out of a show because she was at the wrong end of some questions asked by who else but some students.
ReplyDeleteOf course the idea of SU was wrong from the start. You can engineer a University. It is not like building a Metro. The University has to grow organically.
People who have tasted power for a long time (like the incumbent CM of Sikkim) have delusions of grandeur. They want to be known as institution builders. It is probable that such type of thought process may have been behind the idea of SU. It must have seemed like a match made in heaven. A poet and a visionary CM coming together with a son of the soil (albeit from across the Teesta) academic to build a grand institution.
The only thing is MP Lama has a history of falling out with his political patrons. His experience with Ghising was not good. His blueprint (or vision document , call it whatever you will) was a non-starter.
I personally don't think it is a case of not being able to suffer fools. He doesn't sound very intelligent either. I am talking about some of the stuff that I have read in websites which have been attributed to him.
Every one in power - to whatever extent it is - thinks of self preservation - same to same as Mamatadi, Chamlingjui, Lamajui,Gurungjui, and not forgetting NBB in his era!!! Its just that for what ever reason, things seem to have gone totally wrong and i think the next person whether he be a stooge or an independent person- will face an up hill task.......with various depttments with minuscule number of students!
DeleteSuch a sorry state of affairs in an institution built with such vim and vigour!! Even before the first VC completes his term , the discontent has resurfaced instigated or otherwise! What is a lay man to do but sit and watch the drama unfold till the arrival of the new man to take up the job and toe the govt line!!!
ReplyDeleteThis is what happens when you follow double standards.
ReplyDeleteWhile the going with the CM was good, Sikkim was a model state, now that it is not good, the CM is a bad person.
MPL thought, he could hunt with the hounds and run with the hares.
Everything in SU is a stupid imitation of JNU, so I wonder why student activism and democratic culture is not.
And as the University taught us, MPL is no one to decide what is good for the UNiversity.
The CRUCIAL question is, where were the checks and balances in the University administration in MPL's term.
The answer is NONE.
If MPL opens his mouth, ever again, about democracy or decentralisation, we should have a kangaroo court and sentence him.