People's Democracy

Students Agitate Against Common Fees

STUDENTS under the banner of the joint action committee of student unions comprising the SFI, AISF, PDSU, NSUI and other student unions have been agitating in various forms in Andhra Pradesh, protesting against the decision of the state government to introduce a system of common fees in engineering colleges and abolish free seats.  The police resorted to lathicharge on agitating students at various places in the state and arrested them on a large scale. Leaders of SFI, AISF, PDSU, NSUI, AIDSO, BDSF and PDSU (Vijrumbhana) were among those arrested. ABVP also organised some agitation programmes separately.

Taking advantage of the Supreme Court judgement, which gave a free hand to the minority and unaided engineering colleges in matters of admissions and fees, the state government, had increased the annual fees to Rs 22,000 from the earlier Rs 8000. It has also abolished the system of allotting free seats on the basis of merit. Protesting against this, the students, at the call of the joint action committee, held protest demonstrations at centres of counselling for admissions into engineering colleges at Hyderabad,           Tirupati, Warangal, Guntur and Visakhapatnam on July 18.  More than fifty activists were injured in the police lathicharge at Tirupati, Hyderabad and Warangal. As a result of persistent agitation by the students, braving police repression, the counselling was delayed by about two hours.

Condemning this lathicharge on the students, there was a statewide protest by students on July 19 in different forms – rasta roko, boycott of classes, dharnas, burning of effigy of the chief minister and closure of educational institutions. Several political parties extended their support to the protesting students. The home minister promised to take action against the police officials responsible after examining the reports on the incidents.

The  chief minister, N Chandrababu Naidu, the minister for technical education and officers concerned argued that  the revised  fees for engineering courses in Andhra Pradesh was  lower compared to several other states.  But later, forced to relent in the face of resolute struggle of the students, the state cabinet decided to file an affidavit in the Supreme Court, seeking further clarification on the issues of fees and admissions in engineering colleges. The joint action committee of student unions termed the move of the government in filing an affidavit seeking such clarifications from the Supreme Court  as a mere trick to hoodwink the students and their parents, and to water down the agitation of the students in order to complete the counselling for admissions this academic year.  The student leaders demanded the TDP government to bring pressure on the central government, if it was really sincere,  to make an enactment in the parliament to see that the judgement was not implemented and the old system of admissions and fees restored.

On July 22, on the call given by the joint action committee, the students conducted rail roko agitation in the state, demanding abolition of common fees system and continuance of the system of free seats in engineering colleges.  A number of trains were stopped by the students at Secunderabad, Nellore, Karimnagar, Cuddapah, West Godavari, Warangal, Nalgonda, Khammam,  Prakasam, Mahbubnagar and Srikakulam districts.   Again, the police resorted to lathicharge on the students and took  them into custody at several places.  On July 25 also the students under the banner of the joint action committee conducted rasta roko in Hyderabad, Guntur and Warangal.  Leaders of the joint action committee condemned the lathicharge and arrests. (MVR)