Mumbai: After previously targeting both teaching and non-teaching staff, as well as individual students, the administration at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) has now turned its focus toward student groups. The latest target is the Progressive Students Forum (PSF), which the institute officially “banned” with immediate effect through a one-page notice issued on Monday (August 19).
In the letter, signed by the institute’s registrar, Anil Sutar, the institute claimed that the students’ forum is “illegally” operating on campus. “This group has been engaging in activities that obstruct the institute’s function, defame the institute, demean members of our community, and create division among students and faculty.” The institute’s administration also accused the PSF of “misleading, distracting, and misguiding students from their academic pursuits and harmonious life on campus.”
PSF is a loosely formed, left-leaning student organisation. It has been active on campus for many years, focusing largely on raising student issues and questioning the institute on multiple occasions for towing the government’s line.
TISS, an old social sciences institute, recently lost its autonomy and is now directly governed by the University Grants Commission (UGC). Losing autonomy has also cost the students their right to raise issues with the administration on campus.
This is not the first time that the PSF has been targeted by the institute. In April, Ramadas Prini Sivanandan, a PhD scholar from the Dalit community, was suspended for participating in a protest organised in Delhi against the National Education Policy (NEP). Sivanandan, a PSF leader, was accused of participating in “anti-national activity,” and the institute went so far as to invite law enforcement agencies to “investigate” him. Sivanandan has taken TISS to court.
Like PSF, TISS has several student groups organised according to their political leanings. Among these active groups are the PSF, Adivasi Students Forum (ASF), Ambedkar Students Association (ASA), North East Students Forum (NESF), Fraternity Movement (FM), Muslim Students Forum (MSF), and Democratic Secular Students Forum (DSSF). Right-wing groups like the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) have also found a foothold in the institute in recent years.
Notice issued by TISS banning PFS.
Banning an organisation is a first for TISS. The language of the order, members of PSF say, criminalises them. “Any student or faculty member found supporting, associating with, or propagating the group’s divisive ideologies will be subject to disciplinary action as outlined in our institute policies,” the order reads. The institute has also sought information on students or faculty members participating in PSF activities to be brought to their notice. “All reports will be handled with utmost confidentiality,” the office order claims.
Many student members have called this order a “witch hunt.” “The institute has already shown what it can do. One student has already been suspended, and the institute was eager for the police to go after him and others. Now they have made us look like a banned terror organisation,” a student told The Wire.
Among the recent issues raised by PSF is the erratic hostel facilities available to newly joined postgraduate students. In an email to the institute, PSF wrote that TISS has converted hostel services into a luxury rather than treating it as a basic facility essential for students.
TISS calls PSF “illegal” in its recent order, a diktat issued without providing details of the grounds for the ban. The institute has not explained the “illegality” of the organisation, nor has it elaborated on the supposed obstruction that PSF has caused to the institute’s functioning. Other allegations of misleading and misguiding students have also not been explained.
The institute has regressed substantially from its past image. Last month, close to a dozen PhD scholars, all belonging to the Dalit, Adivasi, and Other Backward Classes (OBC), were handed eviction notices for having “overstayed” on campus, even though most of them had only stayed for two or three years. Just days before that, as many as 115 teaching and non-teaching faculty members at TISS were served termination letters. Following uproar, the institute was compelled to withdraw the termination letters.
