Shajahan Abdul Basheer
Assistance Professor Madapally Government College, Kerala
"Apart from those teachers who refuse to come out of their ‘elite campus nostalgia’, it is indeed difficult for most of us to continue working in an atmosphere with constant threats to life (being the member of a left leaning teachers’ organisation wouldn’t make matters any better). While we ourselves (the teaching faculties) are working under fear, anticipating the fatal attacks from the ‘young comrades’, the condition of other campus organizations and its members would be needless to reiterate. It is not at all surprising to hear about SFI violence against UDSF/KSU/MSF/FRATERNITY, including women students in Govt college Madappally. It was during my service period in that college that some of these hooligans seriously manhandled a teacher who was a famous poet (also a regular presence in leftist platforms).
In Madappally College, the attack against other political organizations and destruction of their posters and banners got normalized over the years. They operate within the aggressive binary of ‘either with us or against us’. It is very ironical to see that they shout Democracy, Socialism and Independence after all these.
They assume superior authority on all campus affairs with their sheer arrogance induced by muscle power. Their fascistic way of organization is indeed unbearable and problematic; though I myself am a card holding member of leftist organization, still can’t refrain from stating the obvious.
I am reminded of one such incident , when a candidate from opposite party had won the elections in 2017 after 20 years. Teacher's including myself, who was then the returning officer of elections, were abused and blocked by these comrades for hours after declaration of results. I had to shift from a quarters in the college premises for 4 days, fearing an attack. The fact that I am a teacher wouldn’t make me immune from their stabs and smacks.
I strongly feel that the guts shown by Adil Ali, Salwa Abdulkader, Sahiba Thamjitha and the rest of the student.
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