NIT, Srinagar should return to normalcy soon
With the administrative authorities and security personnel on full alert in Srinagar and the on-campus violence at the National Institute of Technology under investigation, the situation must now return to normalcy. It is unfortunate that the matter, which started off as a confrontation between two groups of students, was allowed to escalate to this level, wherein paramilitary forces have had to be deployed to keep peace and the Union Minister for Home Affairs has had to intervene. It also seems like the police action on Monday, instead of keeping the situation under control, worsened it.
This could have been handled better, especially since the situation was already tense and tempers were running high. Students allege that they were beaten by the police when they sought to leave the campus on Monday, even though there were no restrictions on their movements. Police officials claim they had no choice but to lathi-charge when students resorted to raucous sloganeering and attacked police personnel. In all probability, the truth lies somewhere in between.
looking ahead, the immediate focus must be on ensuring the safety and well-being of all students. If those from out-of-town are feeling threatened or vulnerable, the authorities must take up their concerns in all seriousness and assure them that they will not be harmed. For the long term, the authorities could look into sensitisation initiatives to avoid such confrontations in the first place. Slice it whichever way you will, the ground situation in Kashmir, be it in terms of public opinion or law and order enforcement or the presence of the state machinery, is different from the rest of the country. Now, this is not to suggest by any means that out-of-State students be prohibited from expressing their opinion or that they self-censor, but only that they (especially hot-headed youngsters), be made cognizant of the challenges at hand.
At the same time, it is equally important that Kashmiri students also be made to understand that not everybody shares their views on contentious political issues and they need to respect, if not appreciate, the differences. Some amount of anti-India sloganeering, a little bit of cheering for the cricket team that defeats India may be a routine affair in the valley, hardly raising an eye-brow there. But in the rest of the country, this kind of public behaviour definitely strikes a jarring note and, as this past week's incidents show, can lead to violence. In fact, we have seen similar incidents play out in other parts of the country as well — only with the tables turned — in the case of Kashmiri students studying outside their State. In 2014, for example, a large number of Kashmiri students, studying at a private university in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, were suspended for cheering for Pakistan during an India-Pakistan cricket match. The authorities worried that this could lead to tensions on campus and took ‘precautionary measures'.