Uneasy calm prevails at MANUU campus

Daneesh Majid

Hyderabad: An uneasy calm prevails at MANUU campus as two groups of students from Jammu and Kashmir and Bihar are said to be waiting for an opportunity to strike back at each other after a clash between the two last week.  

The controversy surrounding the resignation of Maulana Azad National Urdu University Vice-Chancellor M. Aslam Parvaiz was only a prelude to what is supposed to be a period of jubilation. The raging Aslam Pervez vs. Firoz Ahmed Bakht battle has already splintered the campus into pro and anti-VC camps. Whether the VC’s ouster brings about any change, positive or negative, remains to be seen.

However, another dispute exposed fault lines within the student body. At the Rang Tarang event which was a part of the larger Maulana Azad commemoration week, which is held around the birth anniversary of Maulana Azad (November 11).

Students from Jammu and Kashmir and Bihar came to blows at the open-air theatre.

A student-volunteer from Jammu asked some students from Bihar to behave after he saw them removing their shirts while dancing. When the Bihari student didn’t acquiesce, things escalated quickly with both groups assembling their clans.

The central park garden outside the administration building served as a venue for the brawl.  It turned so fierce that two students had to be sent to the hospital where they received stitches for their injuries. 

According to a source who wishes to remain anonymous, the Bihari students yelled epithets of “militant” along with “Scheduled Caste” and “Scheduled Tribes” at the J&K students.

The MANUU campus is a politically active one with a vocal Student’s Union as well. This union has been headed by two Presidents from what is now the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. Students from this state have been very much a part of the University’s academic and cultural ethos. 

While teaching, extracurricular activity and other functions are continuing, factionalization within both the teachers, non-teaching staff and groups of students does not bode well for MANUU.