Angry protesting students call IAS Tina Dabi ‘reel star’. She says ‘non-issue created for a viral moment’

Dabi, who has often found herself at the centre of controversies owing to her popularity on social media, is an IAS of Rajasthan cadre. She is currently serving as Barmer collector.

File photo of Barmer collector Tina Dabi | X/@dabi_tina

New Delhi: A social media row has erupted as students protesting a fee hike at Rajasthan University demanded to meet Barmer collector Tina Dabi and accused the administration of arresting them when Dabi refused to meet them.

According to Rajasthan administration officials, it all started with a sit-in protest demanding a rollback in the hike in examination fees at Barmer’s Maharana Bhupal College (MBC) Girls College.

According to Dabi, the matter escalated Sunday when the protesting students continued to demand that the DM meet them, despite the issue being resolved.

“This issue did not warrant the DM’s intervention,” Dabi told ThePrint. “The tehsildar and Additional District Magistrate (ADM) had already spoken to the students, facilitated a conversation between them and the university administration, and they had been assured by the vice-chancellor that the fee hike would be rolled back.”

The students called Dabi a “reel star”, saying she preferred attending media-covered programmes, such as a cleanliness event, rather than students.

Dabi is not a role model for them, one of the protesting students said, alleging that they were arrested for their protest.

However, Dabi denied any arrests.

“I was at a medical college event when this was happening, and I was informed by my staff that some students have blocked the road and are continuously demanding that the DM meet them,” she said. “Now, it is a standard protocol that when someone creates a nuisance by blocking roads, etc., the administration takes them to the police station for sorting out the matter… There were no arrests that were made whatsoever.”

“Can anyone produce any video of the students being forcefully taken away or manhandled or any evidence that they were arrested?” the IAS officer asked.

Sources in the police administration told ThePrint that nobody was arrested.

“It is unfortunate and I don’t want to give credence to this non-event by commenting on it,” Dabi said. “But it’s obvious that it was done by some student leaders who thought they will have their moment if the DM arrives, and all this was done for a moment of virality.”

Dabi, who has often found herself at the centre of controversies owing to her popularity on social media, is a 2015 batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre. She topped the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) exam, and from her personal to professional life, Dabi has always been under media scrutiny.

Three years ago, Dabi left social media owing to the repeated controversies involving her.

Social media campaign

The incident flared up into a massive social media controversy Sunday. “Police arrests kids for calling a controversial IAS officer Tina Dabi a reel star. This is why I am so against these sarkari clowns having any sort of power including access to private data of citizens,” posted Jaidev Jamwal, an X user, whose post had over 1,000 reposts.

“In any non-banana republic, this officer and police would’ve been fired and sued. But nothing will happen here.”

An X handle, “National Council for Men”, posted, “Now this is new. Barmer Police arrested students because they allegedly addressed the District Collector IAS Tina Dabi as Reel Star. Why cannot we address a Reelbaaz Officer as Reel Star?”

However, some commentators read caste and gender-based discrimination in the controversy.

“Constant virtual witch hunting and motivated caste-based offline targeting of Tina Dabi for her Dalit caste is getting quite serious,” said Subhajit Naskar, a political scientist at Jadavpur University.

“Her Dalit woman status has been constantly overshadowing the tremendous work she is doing. Take strict action against the casteists whenever required.”

Dabi, however, said that this was a stunt by some publicity-hungry students and was not worthy of further attention.

(Edited by Sugita Katyal)