After Pune teacher’s arrest: Fear and surveillance in the classroom
Avijit Pathak | 7 August 2023 | Indian Express
The primary reason I could celebrate the vocation of teaching for more than three decades was the vibrancy of the dialogic classroom — a space enriched by nuanced conversations, reflections on multiple ways of seeing, the art of listening, or the willingness to expand one’s mental/intellectual horizon.
My students often disagreed with me, and in their own ways interpreted my philosophic location. For instance, some Marxist students would say that I am a Gandhian; and some Ambedkarite students would remind me of my “caste privilege”, and why, as they would think, I cannot understand the gravity of the caste question in Indian politics and society. Not solely that. I would also be seen as someone inclined to the “new left” school of thought because of my references to Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse and Erich Fromm.
However, despite these differences or disagreements, there was no animosity. After class, we could sit together in the university canteen and enjoy our cups of coffee. There was no police complaint, no FIR, no viral video. In other words, there was some sanctity in the teacher-student relationship; there was mutual trust; and the classroom was not a site of surveillance.