Difficult times for academic institutes

Here is some text that was circulated in IITM network by our people (a group of people led by AJ).  At 6 PM (Aug. 27, 2012) about 1700 people walked in the campus as a candle light vigil for about 2 hours.  Details are below and also the links of the press.  We also saw how press some times reports in a biased manner. The press in India has not yet come of age!

Text and links  are as follows.  Prem

Dear Colleagues,

It has been a painful few days for us. We have seen that truth has not prevailed. Our women students feel harassed when photographed against their wishes, and we are not allowed to even point this out. Malicious statements are made against us, and several of our faculty and staff are repeatedly humiliated (some links are given below as examples). Police file an FIR against six of our people. Three are arrested and remanded for two days. We are made to apologize for wrongs not committed.

We cannot even stand up for the truth. It makes us angry and want to fight back. But we will not retaliate. We will fight for truth to prevail. We will let go of our anger. We have to recognise that as teachers, we have failed to teach our youngsters to stand for truth.

We have to re-dedicate ourselves to truth. We will not raise our hands in protest. We will not disrupt anything. We will not even make speeches. We will only appeal to all those who were involved to stand up for the truth. Let their conscience tell them to stand up for it as well. Most of them know the truth. Those who do not can easily find out, for there were many witnesses to the incident and the events thereafter.

We will assemble at Gajendra Circle, IITM at 6 PM on Monday August 28, 2012. We will sing songs and we will have a candlelight vigil with the simple words, “let truth prevail.”  

If the truth fails to prevail, we will do it again and again, without disrupting anything or creating any difficulty for anyone. We will do this without anger. We will do it for ourselves, because we believe in Tagore’s song, “Jodi tor daksunekeunaaase, tobeEklacholo re (even if no one comes hearing your call, then march alone).”

The links to newspaper reports have been avoided here....in good faith. (Jan 26, 2013)