Fact-finding team alleges casteism

Hyderabad: The suicide of Venkatesh Madari, a research scholar in University of Hyderabad on November 24, was a clear case of discrimination against Dalit students on campus, felt the fact-finding committee of Centre for Dalit Studies (CDS).

The four-member committee led by former MLC and educationist Chukka Ramaiah visited the campus and interacted with the student union leaders, faculty members of different departments and the Vice-Chancellor on Thursday.

Speaking to media persons, the committee members pointed out that the recommendations of earlier committees, constituted under the chairmanship of Prof Vinod Pavarala and Prof V Krishna, to look into the cases of Senthil Kumar and Pulyala Raju, who had committed suicides under similar circumstances, were not taken seriously. They were not implemented in letter and spirit, they said.

The fact-finding committee reportedly found that Venkatesh, a research scholar in Dept of Chemistry, had approached eight professors in his department requesting them to be his guide, but they all rejected. He then approached Prof Tiwari, the Director of Advanced Centre for Research in High Energy Materials (ACRHEM), whose subject was physics and had accepted Venkatesh as his research student merely out of compulsion.

However, he had retired in April, 2013, which put him under tremendous mental pressure, the report stated.

The report also found that no permanent 24X7 counseling centers were set up on campus to attend the students’ psychological grievances. “Our universities don’t have sufficient staff to be appointed as research guides and that the condition is in such a way that competent people are not applying for the posts of guides,” said Ramaiah.

Countering the university administration’s version that the university did not have enough funds for hiring guides, he wondered why the university, which was being supported by the DRDO’s funding could be cash-strapped.

He added that a professor due for retirement within two years should not have been allotted as a guide for a research scholar. The allotment of a guide in the case was done in violation of rules.

Mallepalli Lakshmaiah, president, Telangana Vidyavanthula vedika (TVV), demanded a judicial probe by a sitting judge into the case. He said that the persons responsible for the students’ suicides should be tried as per the SC/ ST Atrocities Act.

Prof Y V Satyanarayana recalled that the discrimination he had experienced during his research years in Osmania University decades ago, thus drawing similarities to the events happening in universities these days.

Manikantha and Prashanth, student leaders of UOH, said that the suicides of P Raju, Senthil Kumar and other students in recent times had all happened due to the discrimination they have faced on campus.

They said that students who raised their voice against the administration were being rusticated from their programs. They termed the suicides happening on campus as “Institutional Murders”.

Dalit students and social organisations have appealed to the civil society not to lend a deaf ear to the chronic discrimination being faced by the students belonging to the marginal sections on campuses and urged the student community to create social movements to hold the administration of central universities responsible for the suicides of several students happening in the city.