New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) now has a “Defence Study Association” (DSA). Founded by two PhD students, the study group is a unique one in a university which generally focuses on discussions and debate around ideological and political issues.
The DSA, say its founders, seeks to break the “negative perception” around the subject of defence on campus.
“JNU is an ideological battleground and defence as a subject is seen negatively here,” said Rahul Pandey, co-founder of the association, to ThePrint. “Because of this, there was no association related to this subject till now. We wanted to change this.”
Though not the first student-led initiative on campus, the DSA claims to be the first ever group focused on defence.
However, three months since its formation in March, the association has elicited little interest from students and consists of only 25 members, most of them friends and acquaintances of the founders.
“There are difficulties because defence as a topic in JNU is not a prime focus of attention. We have to explain the purpose of our group to students in detail to get them to participate,” said Shorya Sood, co-founder.
Previous attempts by the establishment to set up courses and centres around the topic of defence and security have been met with resistance.
Most recently, in 2021, the university had introduced a course titled ‘Counter Terrorism, Asymmetric Conflicts and Strategies for Cooperation among Major Powers’ after the JNU Executive Council gave its approval. The inclusion of the course had drawn criticism by the JNU Students’ Union (JNUSU) for allegedly “peddling RSS ideology”.
Before that, in 2018, a centre called ‘National Security Studies’ was established, which included “Islamic Terrorism” as one of its subjects. The centre, show media reports, has been criticised by both JNUSU members and teachers who have termed it as pushing “Islamophobic propaganda”.
There is an air of general skepticism around the DSA, too, on campus. The students ThePrint spoke to believe that such associations cater to larger ideological narratives of the government in power. However, awareness around it is still low. The students’ bodies, such as the All India Students Association (AISA) and the Students’ Federation of India (SFI), that ThePrint reached out to said they had not heard of the DSA.
“There’s no problem in having such associations if they stick to the topic and not use it for ideological peddling,” said Atul Meena, a PhD student at JNU, to ThePrint. “Ever since the Modi government came to power in 2014, there has been Right-wing interference in JNU. The new centres set up in the university usually end up peddling propaganda.”
The DSA will conduct its first event, a webinar, on 30 June, which will be attended by retired Air Force officer, Air Marshal Anil Khosla. The topic of the webinar will be ‘India and China relationship’.
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‘No ideological battle’
The DSA — described by its founders as a “students’ collective” — has distanced itself from political and ideological narratives and claims to be an “apolitical” group which aims to raise awareness on issues related to defence and security among students. But their quest has been a challenging one.
Sood said that the association is open for all and doesn’t discriminate on the basis of one’s political ideology.
“We are inviting everyone. We have students from Left, Right and centre. It is a subject, not a (political) ideological battle. We just want more students to know about India’s relationship with other countries and the role of defence in it. It’s a vast subject,” said Sood.
Robert Yadav, a PhD student of modern history and a DSA member, is preparing for the webinar by designing posters and shuttling between the campus’ popular food joints — Ganga Dhaba and the 24/7 café — to spread the word. But he is skeptical about the turnout.
“Had it been a political meeting, we would have seen hundreds of students attending the webinar. But for a subject like defence, there are not many takers because of their pre-conceived understanding of the subject,” said Yadav.
(Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri)
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