A Nation commits intellectual suicide… Rohit Vemula episode – a postmortem

[dropcap color=”#008040″ boxed=”yes” boxed_radius=”8px” class=”” id=””]I[/dropcap]n the last couple of weeks the nation has witnessed a political pilgrimage to Hyderabad Central University with leaders of political parties queuing up to express their solidarity with sympathizers of Rohit Vemula who resorted to the most unfortunate action of committing suicide. Without a second thought the whole country needs to feel ashamed that a young research scholar had to commit suicide but at the same time one cannot shy away from analyzing the circumstances surrounding the entire episode.

The energetic Mainstream Media (MSM) got excited and went overboard to project this unfortunate incident as a caste war and discrimination against a Dalit scholar. Here is a recap of what really happened before coming to judgment:

• A terrorist called yakub memon was hanged and a group of students sympathized by taking out a procession in Hyderabad Central University, shouting slogans saying that if you kill one Yakub we will create hundred more Yakubs.

• Sushil Kumar, another student expresses his displeasure on a Facebook (FB) post. The same night a group of students along with about twenty outsiders go to Sushil’s room, manhandle him and force him to delete his FB post in addition to taking a forcible written apology.

• Sushil was hospitalized and his mother tried in vain to get justice from the University authorities. When the University fails to react she approaches the High Court of Telangana for justice. The Honble high court orders the university to look into the matter. In parallel the student also approaches the local Member of Parliament (MP) and also the sole central minister from Telangana, Mr Bandaru Dattatreya for justice.

• The Minister rightfully forwards the students representation to the concerned Ministry viz. Human Resources Development (HRD) Ministry. The HRD Ministry also rightfully refers the matter to the University. After a thorough inquiry, the University decides to suspend the 5 students responsible for this action. Subsequently upon representation by the students the university re-considers, decides to water down the gravity of the punishment to suspension from the hostel.

The main contentions are, one a Dalit committed suicide, two it was because of discrimination and three, freedom of expression was sought to be curbed.

[dropcap color=”#008040″ boxed=”yes” boxed_radius=”8px” class=”” id=””]T[/dropcap]he TRP desperadoes, Power brothels and Sickular psychos swing into action and conveniently ignore the student’s father and grandmother’s repeated assertions that they are Vadderas which is a backward community and not Dalits. Further the father makes a grave allegation that his son was killed and he suspects the fellow students belonging to Ambedkar Students Association to be responsible for it.

For the record, Mr Sushil hails from a backward community, the Minister Mr Dattatreya is a backward classes person himself and the HRD minister who ordered the inquiry is a person belonging to a minority community. Hence it is very clear that it in was no way a caste war as it is made out to be.

Then comes the grand talk of constitutional right of freedom of expression. If supporting terror is a right which needs the protection of the position-less opposition, doesn’t the student who was beaten up have the right of expression too? Where is the case for justifying the action of attacking the victim and filing cases on him? I can understand if this sort of reaction comes from a lawless country but shockingly the Indian intelligentsia and MSM seem to have gone for a genocide of rational thinking and committing a collective suicide of its own intellect. This also tends to make me doubt if we are living in our own country as commented by an editor of a local Telugu daily.

[dropcap color=”#008040″ boxed=”yes” boxed_radius=”8px” class=”” id=””]I[/dropcap]t is high time nationalists and people in power start calling a monkey, a monkey else very soon we will become a nation of donkey republic and have a new Indian dictionary to sell the world where definitions of the terms Secularism, Patriotism and Nationalism in Indian context will be read as secularism means appeasing some sections to the advantage of others, patriotism is criticizing one’s native culture/ practices, praising alien culture a noble deed and nationalism is doing anything that is against the interest of the country one lives in.

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Sudhish Rambhotla

A Chartered Accountant with a Law degree, Sudhish Rambhotla is the Chief Spokesperson of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Andhra Pradesh. He is an alumni of Harvard Business School, a successful entrepreneur and has an Honorary Doctorate from Burkes University.
Sudhish is also a National Vice President of Virat Hindustan Sangam.

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• A Nation commits intellectual suicide… Rohit Vemula episode – a postmortem - February 3, 2016