Over 500 academicians from universities in India, the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom have urged the foreign ministers of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, or SAARC, countries to revoke the suspension of four professors from the South Asian University in Delhi.
The South Asian University is an international university established by the eight SAARC member nations.
Professors Snehashish Bhattacharya, Srinivas Burra, Irfanullah Farooqi and Ravi Kumar were suspended on June 16. They were held guilty of inciting a month-long student protest in September after the monthly stipend of those pursuing master’s degrees at the university was reduced from Rs 5,000 to Rs 3,000.
Even as the university rolled back the decision, the protests continued as the students demanded that the stipend be increased to Rs 7,000.
On November 4, the university expelled five students, prompting an indefinite mass hunger strike by students. The protest subsequently ended after vacations were announced in December, following which show-cause notices were issued to the faculty members.
In its letter to the foreign ministers, the academicians called upon the South Asian University administration to immediately revoke the “unfair and arbitrary suspension orders” and establish a congenial academic environment on the campus.
“The censuring actions taken against the professors stand in conflict with the traditions of openness, dialogue and mutuality that are the hallmarks of the Indian education system,” the academicians said. “They also stand in conflict with a faculty’s obligations to speak on students’ behalf and ensure a safe and supportive learning environment that promotes the well-being and educational development of students.”
The academics said that “arbitrary” action against the professors violates the norms of accountability, transparency, integrity and sustainability of academic institutions.
“This will undermine a vibrant and productive academic community and can erode the trust and academic character of the university,” they said.
The signatories of the letter included academics from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, University of Delhi and Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (Kolkata), Aligarh Muslim University and foreign universities such as Princeton University, Columbia University, the University of California, the London School of Economics and SOAS University of London among others.
The suspension
In a show cause notice dated December 30, the university the faculty members if they were part of “Aijaz Ahmad Study Circle-A Marxist Study Circle Run by the Students of the South Asian University”.
On May 19, the university constituted a fact-finding committee to inquire into the involvement of faculty members in the protest.
The faculty members alleged that on May 19, the fact-finding committee asked them to answer between 132 to 246 questions in writing using pen and paper. The professors were asked to answer all the questions by the end of the day while sitting in front of the fact-finding panel.
“This looks like a targeted action against four people in the university who were simply trying to tell the administration to resolve the issues amicably,” one of the suspended faculty members had told The Indian Express.
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