Journalism school turmoil: Ragged right or justified?

The Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC) has been in the eye of a storm for almost a year now.

In March last year, Amit Sengupta, a journalist of long standing and a faculty member at the Central government-funded journalism institute resigned. This followed his transfer from Delhi to the IIMC’s Dhenkanal (Odisha) campus. Autonomous but under the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, the institute has six campuses across the country. Sengupta alleged that his transfer was a ‘punishment’ for his support to several student-led agitations, particularly the ones at Pune’s Film and Television Institute of India, Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University and Hyderabad Central University. Additionally, he charged that the IIMC was becoming ‘saffronised’ after the new director-general, KG Suresh, took over last year.

The same month, an online news portal ran an investigative report about an alleged rape case involving a Dalit sanitation worker and an IIMC official. It repeated allegations that the institute was shielding the official.

In the months that followed, more controversies arose. Towards the year-end, an academic associate, Narendra Singh Rao, was fired and he challenged his dismissal; the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) is currently hearing the matter. After receiving the institute’s response on February 23, the tribunal has fixed the next hearing on March 20. In January this year, student Rohin Verma was suspended for reporting on Rao’s dismissal and other developments for another news portal. However, following an outcry, mainly from alumni, he was reinstated after deposing before a disciplinary committee.

BL ink spoke with a cross-section of students, alumni, faculty, and administration staff at the Delhi campus on the allegations of ‘saffronisation’, ‘favouritism’ and ‘authoritarianism’, as also the impact of the unrest on studies.

On the day of my visit a seminar was in progress, organised by a group called Pravasi Odia Vikash Samiti. The main agenda of the discussion, according to the brochure, was ‘Security Concerns in Odisha’. Even a cursory look at the list of speakers showed a preponderance of those associated with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its student wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), which owes allegiance to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).

A group of students belonging to the department of radio and television journalism smirked at the mention of the conference. They said that despite assurances from Suresh that politicians from the Congress party and Biju Janata Dal would participate to bring in a diversity of views, the panel clearly favoured one side of the ideological divide. “It is being said that the Maoists operating in Odisha are mainly illegal immigrants from Bangladesh,” one of the students said.

I later learnt that when a student, Sachin Jha Shekhar, had challenged this view at the conference, he was asked not to speak in favour of ‘anti-national’ elements.

Shekhar had earlier faced administrative action, together with four other students — Saket Anand, Vaibhav Palnitkar, Ankit Kumar Singh and Abhik Deb. Like Verma, they supported Rao and spoke against his dismissal on Facebook. For this, they were pulled up by the administration and letters were sent to their parents informing them that their wards were indulging in activities not conducive to the college’s functioning. The students, on their part, insisted that though they refrained from using the term ‘saffronisation’, it was open knowledge that the institute had taken a partisan turn in recent months. They said only those with conservative views, especially those with clear links to the ruling BJP, were invited to deliver guest lectures — a charge also levelled earlier by Sengupta and Rao.

They also said that only students who were close to the administration were sent to conferences and seminars held at ministries, and for discussions in TV studios. They cited Verma’s suspension and Rao’s dismissal as proof of the administration’s ‘authoritarian’ ways. “Even asking questions is being seen as a sign of being a leftist,” said Singh.

Some of the alumni members opposing the administration’s actions agreed to come on record. Avinash Kumar Chanchal, a former student of Hindi journalism who is currently working with an international NGO, alleged that the institute was blocking those who criticised it on social media (www.dnaindia.com/delhi/report-iimc-blocks-alumni-on-social-media-2293610).

The rape charge has cast a shadow on several incidents that transpired later. For instance, Rao claimed in an open letter that his dismissal was a consequence of his support for the aggrieved woman and her husband. The couple corroborated this. “Rao sir helped us a lot,” the husband said, even as he alleged that their dismissal was intended to pave the way for the return of the accused to the Delhi campus, from his current stint in Jammu. Struggling to find another job, the couple is facing a severe financial crunch. “We are living on my mother’s pension,” the husband said teary-eyed, and alleged that some members of the administration had tried to force them to withdraw the rape charge.

With the responsibility of caring for his mother and a younger brother, Rao too is struggling without his job. “My father died last year after battling cancer for three years, and his treatment wiped out our savings,” he said, when we met at a restaurant in Munirka. His cup of tea remained untouched as he narrated his recent ordeal.

Aged 32, he is only too aware that few would care to employ him now, given the circumstances in which he was dismissed. This makes it all the more important for him to win the case and return to his previous job. “No one had a problem with me for six years when I was teaching at the institute, but in the six-and-a-half months since the new DG took charge, I was dismissed,” he said. Except for Sengupta, none of the other faculty members had come out in his support, he added.

A source close to Surabhi Dahiya, the dean of student welfare, with whom Rao had a run-in ahead of his dismissal, claimed that Rao had failed to perform certain administrative tasks that were expected of him. He also described him as an arrogant person who was rude to colleagues. “As per his contract, he can be dismissed without any reason being assigned,” the source added.

Dahiya’s appointment as the dean of student welfare, as well as the head of advertising and public relations raised some eyebrows. However, Suresh, who was previously with the Vivekananda Foundation, a think-tank said to be backed by the RSS, denied all charges of partisanship in the institute’s functioning. He cited the presence of Alok Mehta, editor of Outlook Hindi , and noted poet K Satchidanandan on seminar panels to buttress his claim that those with Left and liberal views were not excluded.

On Rao’s dismissal, he declined to comment as the matter was sub-judice. As for Verma, he said his news report was ‘biased’ against the institute. He refused to comment on the charges levelled by Sengupta (who, he claimed, used to be a friend), as he was not in charge at the time of the incident.

Asked if the ongoing campus strife was affecting their studies, the students were divided in their views. Those perceived as close to the administration denied any adverse impact while others said the general atmosphere had been vitiated. The latter also worried that their placements might be affected.

Placements at IIMC remain a thorny issue. Around 250 students enrol each year for the postgraduate diploma course, which offers four streams — Hindi journalism, English journalism, radio and TV, and advertising and public relations. PG diploma courses in Urdu — started earlier this year under Suresh — and Odia are also offered.

Students said that the department of advertising and PR usually bagged the best placements, including higher salaries, leading to resentment in the other departments. Chanchal said his Hindi journalism course lacked in reporting assignments and was largely confined to theoretical aspects. In the department of radio and TV, while some students felt there was need for better equipment, others insisted the quality of equipment had improved in recent times.

The latter were also happy with their practical assignments, which included producing Lab Journals. “Some teachers espouse leftist views but there is no issue with that. We retain the aspects we find useful,” said Mudit Sharma, a student who supported the administration’s actions.

Suresh agreed that the students needed to be trained better, especially with private institutes giving them competition. He mentioned there had been complaints from recruiters that the students lacked in job-preparedness. He added that, most of all, a better grasp of English was required and two new teachers were taking care of this aspect — one of them was a Fulbright scholar on an exchange programme and the other is from a US university.

Should the government be running a journalism institute at all? Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, a senior journalist and editor of the Economic and Political Weekly , pointed out that the education at IIMC was subsidised and thus cheaper — and thereby affordable to poorer sections — than private institutes. He added that any government would attempt to influence the functioning of the institute for political gains and end up promoting “ideological fellow-travellers.”

He also drew parallels with the strife witnessed earlier at FTII and the Central Board for Film Certification, where the government was accused of making blatantly political appointments. “They want to put their own people in important positions. The same story is being repeated and we will see more of it as long as this government is in power.”