What threatens fascism the most is the idea of a free-thinking human being and an educational space that nurtures a critical outlook. From JNU to Punjab University to Lucknow and across campuses, we are witnessing a renewed wave of repression orchestrated by the Sangh-BJP ecosystem in collusion with the state apparatus.
Across campuses, students are rising for equity, dignity, campus democracy, and affordable education. In response, the BJP-ABVP machinery is working to turn universities into battlegrounds of hate, pushing communal, Manuvadi, and patriarchal politics while crushing every voice of dissent.
In JNU, students were thrown into jail for demanding action against casteist discrimination and a casteist Vice Chancellor. In Punjab, students resisting the poison of RSS hatred were detained. In Bangalore, those who spoke out against militarised violence and sexual assault faced organised right-wing attacks. In Lucknow, even the basic right of Muslim students to offer namaz became a target, with solidarity actions met by state repression.
In the first part of a series on campuses as spaces of critical education and struggle, Comrade Smriti examines JNU, the New Education Policy, and the broader ideological assault that seeks to hollow out education, strip it of its critical edge, and reduce it to an instrument of control under fascism. Comrade Nitish, former JNUSU President who was arrested and jailed in Tihar, reflects on prisons as extensions of this system, where casteist and communal hierarchies structure everyday violence.
The developments in JNU, ranging from curricular changes and privatisation, to the criminalisation of protest are all elements of the political project of RSS that seeks to dismantle the very possibility of an egalitarian education.
At the centre of this transformation lies the vision articulated in the National Education Policy (NEP). The NEP in practice enables an unprecedented centralisation of authority over academic structures, curricula, and institutional priorities. It also opens the door to a model of the university that is less concerned with fostering critical thought and more invested in producing compliant, depoliticised subjects.
The introduction of “Indian Knowledge Systems” (IKS) courses and the outsourcing of Value Added Courses (VACs) to the Siddhanta Foundation, a private entity, must be understood within this broader policy shift. Far from being supplementary, these courses reshape what counts as legitimate knowledge. It elevates a narrow, Brahmanical framework while marginalising scientific temperament and anti-caste traditions in academia.
The implementation also raises serious concerns: students are forced into poorly designed, pre-recorded online courses by an unaccountable private entity. These courses are riddled with technical glitches, yet these courses are enforced with minimal choice for students.
By outsourcing teaching to for-profit entities, the university has turned knowledge into a commodity. Public funds are channelled into private hands, while the JNU admin evades any responsibility for academic standards.
If the restructuring of the curriculum represents one axis of this transformation, the expansion of surveillance represents another. JNU Admin recently attempted to introduce facial recognition and smart-card entry systems in the university library.
The contrast between the administration’s willingness to invest in surveillance and its persistent claims of financial constraints in other areas is particularly striking. Students have long faced inadequate hostel facilities, crumbling infrastructure, and a severe shortage of academic resources like books and journal subscriptions.
Every time the students place basic demands in front of the administration, we are told that they have no funds. Yet, when it comes to installing high-tech monitoring systems, these constraints seem to vanish. This selective allocation of resources exposes their priorities: the disciplining of bodies takes precedence over the nurturing of minds.
Moreover, the imposition of these measures without consultation reflects an erosion of democratic practices within the university. Decisions that fundamentally alter the nature of campus life are taken unilaterally, without meaningful engagement with students, faculty, or staff. The language of “security” and “efficiency” is deployed to justify these moves, masking the gradual consolidation of authoritarian governance.
Parallel to these developments is the systematic weakening of institutional safeguards for marginalised communities. The rollback of UGC Equity rules marks a significant retreat from the commitment to social justice that has historically underpinned public higher education in India. The stay on UGC Equity rules has left students from marginalised communities increasingly exposed to discrimination.
Within JNU itself, there are numerous practices that disproportionately impact Dalit, Adivasi, and other marginalised students. There is evidence of systemic discrimination in PhD admissions, including manipulated cut-offs, biased viva evaluations, a decline in SC/ST student enrolment, and discriminatory practices in hostel allotment. There is also a targeted academic victimisation of Dalit and women students, and a lack of institutional support.
The role of the current Vice-Chancellor must be understood in this context. Her publicly reported anti-Dalit and anti-Black remarks are proof that she has fostered an institutional climate in which such attitudes are normalised and, at times, legitimised. The promotion of Brahmanical ideals within the curriculum, the tolerance of exclusionary practices, and the absence of meaningful accountability mechanisms all point to a leadership that is aligned with, rather than resistant to, the broader ideological shift underway.
Unsurprisingly, these developments have provoked sustained resistance from the student community. JNU has a long history of democratic engagement, where students actively participate in shaping the intellectual and political life of the campus. In response to the current crisis, students went on strike and conducted a referendum in which an overwhelming majority called for the removal of the Vice-Chancellor.
Yet, the administration’s response has been marked by an escalating pattern of repression. Students have been subjected to punitive fines and legal action for their involvement in protests. Five students, including JNUSU President Aditi and ex-president Nitish were rusticated and declared out of bounds. Fourteen JNU students were arrested in Tihar jail for raising their voices for a future with equitable higher education in India. Protest is, therefore, no longer treated as a legitimate form of political expression, but as a threat to be neutralised.
The trajectory that JNU is on, from ideological imposition as under the guise of NEP, erosion of equity, to the criminalisation of dissent, all represent one coherent political project. Each element reinforces the others, creating a self-sustaining system of control. The curriculum shapes the ideological framework, surveillance enforces compliance, weakened safeguards enable exclusion, and repression silences opposition. What emerges is a university that is no longer a site of intellectual freedom, but an apparatus of governance.
A university, at its core, is not merely a collection of buildings, courses, and administrative structures. It is a space where ideas are contested, where knowledge is produced through dialogue and disagreement, and where individuals are empowered to question existing hierarchies. However, when these functions are compromised, the institution loses its essence.
The struggle unfolding in JNU, therefore, is not just about a particular set of policies or the tenure of a single administrator. It is about defending the very idea of the university as a democratic and egalitarian space. It is about resisting the reduction of education to a tool of ideological reproduction and administrative discipline. And it is about asserting that knowledge, in its truest sense, cannot flourish under conditions of fear, surveillance, and exclusion.
If universities are to remain spaces of freedom and possibility, this transformation must be confronted—not only within JNU, but across the country. The stakes are nothing less than the future of higher education itself.
