In JNU today, the price for free speech is Rs 20,000
Anirban Bhattacharya, Banojyotsna Lahiri | 14 December 2023 | Indian Express
When we were students at JNU, hunger strikes were a routine affair. As a new batch of students joined the campus, there were various freshers’ parties at school and hostels, but from the Students’ Union, their welcome was done with a prolonged hunger strike. Some demands were recurring — proper implementation of reservation, the building of adequate hostels, adding more facilities for the health centre, fair wages for workers on campus, and so on. Some new demands emerged every year, specific to the academic calendar of that session. From articulating our demands to patiently navigating the many voices from within the student community; from protest songs to colourful placards; from finishing our assignments to writing our thesis — there was always enough food for thought at the site even as we beat hunger.
At times, the sieges would yield in triumphs, at times they would yield half measures. On occasion, they would also yield nothing. But the right to lay siege to what we called the Pink Palace was a crucial learning exercise for us as students and as citizens in a democracy in practice. The JNU journey of new students would take off only after they took part in those protests….