Students Plan ‘March To Parliament’ On November 23

Left Student Organisations Convention Held

A JOINT convention of the Left student organisations gave a call for a massive students march to the parliament on November 23 to press for achieving their demands. The convention was held at the Constitution Club, New Delhi on October 1, 2004 by SFI, AISF, AISB and AIPSU. A resolution urging the UPA government to act against the commercialisation of education was unanimously adopted by the convention (full text is given along with this writeup). The convention was presided by K K Ragesh, president of SFI and Ramakrishna Panda, president of AISF.

Central leaders of CPI(M), CPI, RSP and Forward Block addressed the convention and expressed full support and solidarity with the student demands.

Sitaram Yechury, Polit Bureau member of the CPI(M) in his speech urged the students to carry on struggles to pressurise the UPA government to honour its commitments made in the CMP. He reminded the government that the verdict 2004 was basically against the anti-people economic reform policies and communalism.  The Congress-led UPA government should thus pursue policies in consonance with this verdict of the people. Providing education for all and ensuring that no one is denied access to higher education, he observed, is ‘the basic responsibility of the state’. He also asked the students to understand the policies of liberalisation and globalisation which were behind the senseless drive of privatisation and commercialisation of education. He commended the initiative of the Left student organisations in mobilising the student community for achieving their demands. Yechury also promised all the support of the Left parties and their MP’s for the just cause raised by the student organistions.

D Raja, central secretariat member of the CPI criticised the earlier NDA government for its mindless commercialisation of education. He observed that the courts also were influenced by the policies of the liberalisation and were thus unable to safeguard the rights of the students. He also supported the initiative taken by the student organisations.

Abani Roy of the RSP and Devarajan of the Forward Bloc also addressed the convention.

Earlier Kallol Roy, general secretary of the SFI moved the resolution demanding the enactment of a central legislation empowering the state governments to control the private unaided institutes. The resolution demanded the government to decide the fee structure, admissions and all other aspects in the unaided institutes. Reservations have to be implemented in all the institutes and quality has to be maintained. It also wanted the government to ensure democratic rights in these institutes and put an end to all sorts of harassment and victimisation. Vijender Kesri, general secretary of AISF, R Arun Kumar, vice president of SFI and Khokhon of the AISB spoke in support of the resolution.

The convention resolved to undertake an intensive campaign among the students and organise state level conventions in all the states. The convention warned the government to accept the just demands failing which the Left student organisations will be forced to intensify the campaign beyond the march to parliament.

Full text of the resolution is given below:

The joint convention of the students organised by the Left student organisations welcomes the pro-student measures announced in the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government. The convention lauds the commitment of the UPA government for secularism and its announcement to detoxify the entire education system from communal scum. It also welcomes the proposal to collect 2 per cent cess for education and the promise to see that no student is denied entry into professional education because of his/her economic condition. The convention hopes that the UPA government will stick to its commitments in the CMP and initiate pro-student measures in the coming days. The UPA government has already completed more than 100 days in office. We believe that now it is time for the government to translate into action all the promises that it had made in the CMP.

Higher education in the country is in absolute mess due to the policies pursued by the earlier BJP-led NDA regime. Many private institutes have mushroomed throughout the country and most of them are run on pure commercial lines. This denies access of education to many thousands of students who come from poor and middle income grouped families. Exorbitant fees are collected by these institutes and there is virtually no regulation or monitoring of admissions into these institutes. The profit-craving attitude of some of the private managements is the reason behind the absence of quality in education imparted in these institutes. Many institutes are practicing dubious means to ensure better results in their institutes and thus corruption, leakage of question papers, malpractice are becoming a regular feature. The lack of any control on these institutes by the government has led to this deplorable situation. The recent judgement of the Supreme Court in the TMA Pai Vs State of Karnataka case had further freed the private institutes from any sort of governmental control and has given these institutes a free hand in collection of fee and conducting admissions. This judgement is against the Indian ethos of education system, which is essentially charitable in nature. Students across the country protested against the judgment and the respective state governments failed to bring any order to the chaos that has set in due to this judgement. Many students had committed suicides, as they are unable to satiate the greed of the unaided institutes and they did not receive any help from the State or any of its financial institutes, contrary to the much hyped policy of sanctioning of educational loans without collateral security. All these together with the subsequent legal tangles that it gave rise to, led the Supreme Court to interpret this judgement by a five-member Bench. Even this has failed to remedy the situation. The only way out of this mess is to enact a central legislation empowering the state governments to control the unaided private professional institutes. This convention demands the UPA government to take the initiative and immediately promulgate an ordinance to this effect and then pass an Act in the parliament during the coming parliament session. This ordinance/Act should guarantee:

1. Access to higher/professional education irrespective of his/her economic condition.

2. Implementation of Constitutionally guaranteed scheme of reservations.

3. Safeguard of merit in admissions to all the seats in an unaided institute.

4. Provisions for proper governmental and social control of these institutes.

5. Ensure democratic rights to the students, teachers and the employees and a

    proper mechanism for redress against harassment and victimisation.

The government should also initiate steps to stop the spurt of fake universities and private deemed universities. Many sub-standard institutes without proper infrastructure are vying to convert their institutes into deemed universities using the loopholes in the existing laws. This enables them to lord over all their activities, even issue certificates to the students and at the same time be unconcerned with the quality of education being imparted. The government and its agency, the UGC, has to immediately strengthen the existing laws and prevent the establishment of deemed universities, which are nothing but private universities. It should be noted here that the Private Universities Bill introduced in the parliament could not be passed as an Act because of the severe opposition to it.

The convention demands that the government act to immediately address the grave concerns of the student community. The convention also appeals to all the peoples' representatives to stand in support of the genuine demands of the students and pressurise the government to act for the welfare of the students. The convention also resolves to organise a march to the parliament on the 23rd of November 2004 for the realisation of students’ demands. State level joint conventions will be organised in all the states in support of these demands and a widespread campaign will be carried out to mobilise the students in large numbers for this march to the parliament. (INN)