ABVP arranges Parliament Tour for JNU freshers, much to Left Unions' chagrin  

The Akhila Bharatiya Parishad is organising a 'Parliament tour' for freshers on campus much ot the ire of the All India Students Association, which  is calling it an 'attempt to lure students with a display of power' and 'proximity to the powerful'. The AISA criticised the ABVP for disregarding all the other problems faced by the students on campus and accused them of diverting attention from real issues, especially since there are over 300 MPs from the BJP who are currently in power.

Titled 'We can't be bought by Power', the AISA statement goes on to state a number of issues facing the campus — from abysmal shortage of hostel since the administration refused to construct new ones despite higher admissions, all-round lack of infrastructure, 80 percent library fund cut, multiple fee hikes in hostels, messes and admissions, refusal to raise MCM, VC’s unilateral move to tie JNU to a huge 515 crore HEFA loan which they claimed 'will only lead to higher fees, user charges, curtailment and commercialisation of campus facilities'.

In their statement, the AISA asks, "Does ABVP think students are commodities, whose consciousness can be can be bought and sold by taking them to meet people in power, throwing food and parties? ABVP is bringing in the politics of rain dance, free movies, free lunches and so on, with which they manage the DU politics, to divert and distract students from their real concerns!"

But this is not the first year that the ABVP is organising such a tour, it is in fact their third year. "In 2016, people in our campus were celebrating a terrorist like Afzal Guru, a person who had attacked our Parliament. From that year on, we decided that we would take our freshers to the parliament," Nidhi Tripathi, a member of the ABVP said. 

Tripathi said that the tour is a method to teach students about the workings of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, "Sometimes if there is an MP who is available, we also get them to talk to the students."

However, the AISA claimed that the ABVP was hand in hand with the JNU VC, who the left parties have been against from the very beginning. "Since the new VC took charge in 2016, not a single brick has been laid for hostels and dormitories. Further, he criminalised all protests, slapped FIRs and imposed fines running into lakhs of rupees on all protestors!" they wrote. They even questioned that fact that SLS faculty Atul Johri, who has eight FIRs of sexual harassment against him was roaming freely in campus