New Delhi: The Jawaharlal Nehru University Students' Union (JNUSU) on Monday said a scheduled discussion on former JNU student Umar Khalid's book, Fractured Communities: Adivasi Histories and the Politics of Power, would go ahead despite the university cancelling the booking of the venue.
The discussion was scheduled for August 10, around the International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples, at the School of Social Sciences-I (SSS-I) auditorium. The university cancelled the booking, saying the organisers had not disclosed the "full facts" about the programme.
JNUSU termed the cancellation "arbitrary and authoritarian" and said the event would instead be held at an alternate venue outside the SSS-II building.
"Cancelling a room does not cancel a conversation. No administrative order can suppress the right of students to think, question, and discuss," the students' union said in a statement.
The union called on students, faculty members and staff to attend the discussion, saying, "Come in large numbers. Defend your right to know, to read, and to discuss."
The event is scheduled to feature Prabhu Mahapatra, Uma Chakravarti, Shuddhabrata Sengupta, Harsh Mander and Banojyotsna, according to the event poster.
ABVP claims campaign led to cancellation
The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) said it had opposed the programme after its poster appeared and claimed that its campaign resulted in the cancellation. JNU's ABVP unit said that after its "continuous protest and efforts", the programme had been cancelled. Its JNU president Mayank Panchal said the university's premises should not be used to "glorify" Khalid, who is in custody in connection with the 2020 northeast Delhi riots conspiracy case.
Panchal described the cancellation as a "victory."
JNUSU disputes university's explanation
JNUSU president Aditi Mishra, from the Left Unity bloc comprising AISA, SFI and DSF, said the organisers had followed the procedure advised by the university.
She said the booking form had been filled in the prescribed format on the explicit advice of the Dean of the School of Social Sciences, and therefore there was no question of incomplete disclosure.
"This is a manufactured pretext for censorship. Why was permission granted at all if disclosure was not complete?" Mishra said.
The union also accused the administration of applying campus rules selectively, pointing to the space and cooperation it said had been provided for events organised by spiritual organisation ISKCON. The university has not publicly responded to that allegation.
Faculty member backs organisers
Avinash Kumar, an assistant professor at JNU's Centre for Informal Sector and Labour Studies, had submitted the venue requisition for the programme.
He also disputed the university's stated reason for the cancellation. "The stated reason for the cancellation of the booking of the SSS auditorium is false," Kumar said, adding that the Dean of the School of Social Sciences was fully aware that the event would discuss Khalid's book.
He asked the administration to explain the actual reason for the cancellation and identify the university rule under which the venue could be withdrawn unilaterally without consultation.
The JNU administration had not responded to the allegations from JNUSU or the professor, nor to the ABVP's claim that its campaign led to the cancellation, as of Sunday evening.
The book at the centre of the dispute
Fractured Communities: Adivasi Histories and the Politics of Power is based on Khalid's PhD thesis, which he submitted to JNU's Centre for Historical Studies in July 2018. The university awarded him his doctorate the following year.
The book examines the history of Adivasi communities in Singhbhum, Jharkhand, with particular attention to the Ho community and the changing relationship between Adivasi social and political structures and colonial and post-colonial forms of state power.
Historian Ramachandra Guha, who wrote the foreword, has described the work as one of the finest doctoral dissertations by an Indian scholar that he has read. Historian Pratap Bhanu Mehta, reviewing the book, described it as a detailed history of the Ho community and highlighted its treatment of Adivasi political agency.
Khalid himself has described the thesis as an attempt to examine the relationship between Adivasi communities and state power, particularly the ways in which colonial and post-colonial administrations interacted with local structures of authority.
The discussion was to feature Prabhu Mahapatra, Uma Chakravarti, Shuddhabrata Sengupta, Harsh Mander and scholar Banojyotsna Lahiri.
Why Khalid remains a contentious figure at JNU
The dispute also comes against the backdrop of Khalid's long association with JNU and the legal cases against him.
Khalid came to national prominence during the 2016 JNU controversy, when he and other students faced sedition-related proceedings following an event on campus. His doctoral research continued during the period of legal proceedings, and JNU ultimately awarded him his PhD in 2019.
He was arrested in September 2020 under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) in the case concerning an alleged conspiracy behind the northeast Delhi riots. He remains in custody and the trial has not begun. The riots, which took place amid protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the proposed National Register of Citizens, left 53 people dead and more than 700 injured.
His supporters have maintained that the charges against him are politically motivated, while the prosecution has accused him of involvement in the alleged conspiracy. The case remains before the courts.
The event was not formally banned
The immediate dispute concerns the university venue, rather than a ban on Khalid's book.
JNU's stated reason for withdrawing the auditorium booking was that the organisers had not disclosed the full details of the programme. JNUSU and the faculty member who submitted the booking dispute that explanation and argue that the administration knew the discussion would centre on Khalid's book.
The union said it would move the programme outside the booked auditorium rather than cancel it. As of the latest reports available, there is no confirmed report that the university has prohibited discussion of the book itself.
