4slam

The Last words of Rohith Vemula: "My birth is my fatal accident."

4slam at

http://raiot.in/last-words-of-rohith-vemula/

Scientist, activist and Ambedkar Students Association leader Rohith Vemula was found dead in a hostel room on the University of Hyderabad campus.Suicide! He was one of the activists on hunger strike from yesterday on the campus against the illegal and demonstrably false case framed against them by the administration. Rohith went out of the tent to a hostel and hanged himself, leaving a suicide note. It was at the behest of BJP leader Bandaru Datttreya, the puppet VC started persecuting these students/scholars. 


Universities As Modern Agraharas*

... even though the marginalised groups can access education as it is constitutionally mandated, exclusion manifests in dubious ways. The principle of merit is largely undefined. However, the social and economic worth of individuals and institutions is valued on the basis of this amorphous principle. Any standard definition of merit will again feed the myth of the “family farm” comprising parental background, alma mater, economic occupations, physicality and geographical location. Needless to say, these privileges are available only to a chosen few who are then considered as “meritorious”, “worthy” and the “best”.

In an ongoing study sponsored by the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) on ‘Discrimination and Exclusion in Institutions of Higher Learning in India’, SC/ST students of four universities — Delhi, Mumbai, Madras and Hyderabad — were mapped. A total of 72 respondents were interviewed on various parameters. More than 70 percent of them felt stigmatised by their caste identity within the classrooms, peer group and the academic environment. Unsurprisingly, Rohith wrote in his suicide note, “My birth is my fatal accident.”

* Agraharas