One is extremely pained when one has to hear one of your ex-faculty member crying and telling her current student "Did I invest 6 years of my life, so you can heckle me?" From the first day till the end and beyond I have never ever found any dearth of support from faculty in TISS. I have always said they were and perhaps are the best thing in TISS Hyd. I have had arguments and disagreements albeit not in public, it never got uncivil definitely not a point where either of us had to cry like that. What has happened to TISS Hyd lately? I have never found it so divided before. There have been challenges and crises which students and faculties have worked together. And Alumni has played an important role.
Today some students seem to be fighting against some faculty members. Most alumni are staying shut. This is not about one or two people. This is much deeper and systemic. This is real fascism we have read and talked about. It won't come in one day out of blue but creep slowly with us, in us. And by being divided we are only helping it further. Our students and our faculty deserve better. After so many years of this recurring problem, the TISS admin needs to learn from its repeated mistakes. And stop subjecting students as well as the faculties to this mental and physical trauma. It is supposed to be India's best social work/sciences institution. Least it can do is stay true to its own principles and ideas. And stop making false promises and start giving the basic minimum.
My heart goes out to all those who might have stepped out of their homes for the first time, from not so large cities and villages. It reminds me of my first few days 5years ago. Rather than adjusting to a new city, a campus and braving the much larger battle up ahead. They have to go through such difficulties so early in life. I hope this makes you all strong. My heart also goes out to faculty members who have always supported the students not just academically but beyond. I hope the space, where for the first time I felt my mind was without fear (except the assignment deadlines). Ideas flowed from so many directions without narrow walls that many universities have built today. There are so many universities in our country with many more problems. Yet what used to make us different was the way we handled it. We were all in this together. We were beyond a university a community, a family. So many times in those two years I had seen how faculty members came to help students, many a time financial out of their pockets. And today they are being called corrupt and what not. Should now we become like other everyone fending for themselves? Let those who want us fail to win.
Many times we say TISS has spread itself too thin. Recently one of our faculty corrected me and she said, ideas and principles need not be diluted where ever you go. If you are true to them they will stay forever with you. Its high time we go back to those core principles which have sailed us through many tough times. We are not perfect but we are model for many and if we fail today many hopes of many from this far-flung nation will be dashed. And many want that, and that's how we let fascism win by fighting with each other and not against the wrongs for which we have stood up for so long. Maybe a lot has changed in TISS but I still believe much has not changed. And we can preserve this edifice we have built, students and faculties, together. That's how we can create the space for education and fight this ever-growing dis-enfranchisement of the marginalised.
I stand with my faculty who have been so generous and magnanimous to me and many more and with all the students fighting for their rights. More power to you. Ladrenge, jeetenge
Comments