Student, youth to protest Centre’s ways

New Delhi: The Young India Adhikar March (YIAM), a group of students and youth organisations opposed to the BJP, said on Tuesday that they would take out a march from Lal Quila to Parliament Street on February 7, to protest against the Modi government's policies, primarily in the education sector.

The decision was announced in a media briefing cum conference in Delhi, especially addressed by academicians with left leanings.

The YIAM said their major demands are to immediately fill all the vacant government posts, increase the number of government jobs, stop paper leaks and corruption in recruitment.

It was also demanded that 10 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product should be spent on education and the government should stop the policy of school closure, seat-cut, fund cut, fee-hike, besides “ending saffronisation of education” and ensure academic freedom and freedom of expression on campuses.

Speaking at an event, Dalit-activist-turned MLA Jignesh Mevani claimed that from 2014 to 2016, over 26,000 students have committed suicide, which came to nearly 25 wards every day, and that student loan should be waived completely.

He also demanded enactment of an act named after Rohith Vemula, a Dalit scholar, who committed suicide alleging caste discrimination at the University of Hyderabad, to end such discrimination.

Mevani also said the 10 per cent reservation in government jobs and academic institutions for the economically weaker sections of the society passed by Parliament, was constitutionally improper.

Slamming the government, activist-lawyer Prashant Bhushan said, the government which came to power after the Lokpal agitation, has failed to appoint an ant-graft ombudsman, five years after coming to power.

The BJP government, Bhushan said, was “damaging” all the major institutions of the country.