JNUSU: Sedition law is a tool to suppress dissent

Attacking the Modi government for falsely implicating JNU Students’ Union president Kanhaiya Kumar, JNUSU vice-president Shehla Rashid Shora alleged that the Centre is using the sedition law as a tool to suppress dissent. Ms Shora made the allegation after the Supreme Court transferred the JNUSU president’s bail plea to the Delhi high court on Friday.

She demanded that sedition charges against the students accused in the JNU row should be withdrawn. Ms Shora said that the current Union government is misusing sedition law to harass in rival and, in this case, against innocent student leaders of one of the prestigious universities of country. “Not a single conviction is happened in sedition charges since 1962. It is only used as tool to harass political rivals,” added Ms Shora.

Students from various organisations, barring the BJP-linked ABVP, are protesting against the arrest of JNUSU president, who allegedly organised the February 9 event on the JNU campus against the Parliament attack case convict Afzal Guru. Mr Kumar’s bail plea will be heard in the Delhi high court next week. She alleged that the BJP-led government has shifted focus from people who raised anti-national slogans during the controversial event. “The government is interested in branding activists as seditionists. Our very own home minister acts on the basis of a fake Twitter handle of Hafiz Saeed.”

Commenting on the student protests disrupting classes on campus, she said, “The classes and protests go together. We don’t see academics and protests in contradiction or opposition to one another.”

The JNUSU vice-president also questioned the university probe panel. Ms Shora said that the inquiry committee set up by JNU to probe the case is not representative of caste, gender and categories as women, Dalit and OBC students will be deposing before it. “JNU has failed to learn from the mistakes of the University of Hyderabad. The committee, which did not have even a single Dalit member, persecuted Rohith — and eventually led to his suicide,” added Ms Shora.