TW: Mentions of casteism
Vinay Sonule, Assistant Professor, Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC), Amravati filed an FIR against Professor Anil Kumar Saumitra, Regional Director of the Institute, under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. The FIR was filed after the former’s contractual appointment was abruptly suspended on Monday morning.
Professor Sonule, who belongs to a minority community, complained of experiencing repetitive institutional othering from the campus head. This includes humiliation in front of the entire staff at a cultural programme.
Professor Saumitra, a former BJP member, joined IIMC as a professor in October 2020. However, he was suspended from the party’s membership in May 2019 after his post on Mahatma Gandhi on social media. The suspension was on the grounds of such posts being against the party’s ethics, ideas and principles.
“Suddenly, on Monday, I received an email informing me that my contract has been suspended. The question here is if the regional director has the power to suspend my contract. My appointment was finalised by the head office in Delhi,” Sonule told the Indian Express.
Sonule, in his official complaint, has iterated that he has been facing this othering for several months now and had already raised an internal complaint before the head in Delhi but to no avail.
“There has been a series of such instances where it was clear that I am being targeted for no specific reason. I was humiliated in front of my students as well as non-academic staff. I was removed from my post of in-charge of examinations on the day of the exam without giving an appropriate reason. My lectures were put on hold.
Students were asking me when I will start teaching again. Even the smallest facilities such as office, printer, email access among all were taken away from me. But throughout this ordeal, I continued serving the institute and did not fall behind on my responsibilities toward students. All this, because I had raised complaints internally. But after the letter in the morning today (Monday), I had to take the step,” he told Indian Express.
The question here is how does one decide to be best friends with someone? Is it based on a conscious choice? What are the factors that influence one to be best friends with another? https://t.co/RelHmJcqLD
— Youth Ki Awaaz (@YouthKiAwaaz) February 10, 2022
As present students of IIMC look back, Professor Sonule in one of his classes reiterated that he had the necessary degrees and proficiency to be teaching in the premiere journalism institute. His reiteration is assumed to be linked to the mistreatment he received from the campus head and his like. IIMC is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
“We initially had no idea that such an incident had happened and that a complaint was lodged. It is shocking, to say the least, that they maintained so much silence about this case,” a present student of IIMC English Journalism course.
“I am ashamed that a professor of my institute had to go through this. Sonule sir has always been very kind to us in class,” said a student of batch 2020-21
Besides this being an extremely horrific discourse for professor Sonule and his family, the incident only reinstates the Indian education system’s pretence with progressiveness.
As we delve deeper into the issue, we reflect that the educational institutes, which should be safe havens for both students and teachers, have emerged as the breeding grounds of hate, bigotry and narrow jingoism.
Current and past students of IIMC dually agree that Professor Sonule was extremely kind, sweet, and a good tutor. His students are disheartened that he had to go through such a traumatic experience. “Sir was always very diligent with us, he never made us feel that he was going through so much trouble in his workspace. We respect him so much,” another student of english journalism course said.
The investigation, in this case, is currently ongoing, and there has been no comment from Professor Saumitra’s side yet. “IIMC sure should bring heavy reformations in their internal committee if they want to build the foundation of the fourth pillar of democracy by educating budding journalists. If this is normalised in a school that teaches social science, our future is in danger,” said a student of 2019-20 batch.
IIMC is rated as the top institute for journalism in the country. However, this incident only exposes the superficiality of ratings because inside, this is just another place that comfortably silences the ‘other’ lambs.