India Tomorrow
New Delhi, Dec 3: India’s premier academic institution Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has planned to have a ‘life-sized’ statue of Swami Vivekananda. In the wake of the recent alleged cut in the varsity’s library fund, students are now wondering about the source of funds for the statue.
“The foundation stone for the statute has been laid, although discreetly. This move has made the students’ union and teachers’ association suspicious about the source of funds for this statute,” says India Today TV.
Reports say that JNU’s Executive Council had given the approval for the statue in June last year.
Sources in the administration told the TV channel that the statue will be placed on the right side of the administrative block. Its position will be opposite to the statue of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.
Who is paying for this statue?
After news reports about the statue, JNU Students’ Union and Jawaharlal Nehru University Teachers’ Association (JNUTA) have questioned the source of the funds for the statue.
“The university says it does not have money to fund library and disburse merit-cum-means scholarship to students. However, it is busy constructing statues,” JNUSU president N Sai Balaji has reportedly said.
JNUSU and JNUTA have filed RTIs asking the JNU administration to disclose the source of funds for the statute.
Last month, JNUSU had alleged that the university has slashed its library budget from Rs 8 crore to less than Rs 2 crore and doesn’t have funds to renew the subscription of e-journals, a crucial tool for research.
The student body termed the Library Advisory Committee a “farce” where these decisions were allegedly taken.
“In an extraordinary and surprising move JNU administration through Rector and Librarian have provided a detailed chart for privatisation of Dr B.R. Ambhedkar Library through massive fund cuts i.e. Rs 8 crore to Rs 1.7 crore,” said the union.
JNU trashed allegation about library fund cut
Following the allegation, the university administration rebutted JNUSU’s charge of a 75 per cent cut in the library budget and termed the media reports based on the allegation “baseless” and the allegation itself “fabrication of facts”.
“Reports in the media that the annual budget for the Dr B. R. Ambedkar (Central) Library of JNU has been reduced from Rs 8 crore to Rs 1.7 crore are completely baseless,” JNU Finance Officer Heeraman Tiwari said in a statement.
He said that the university has been getting only Rs 1.7 crore annually for books and journal subscriptions.
“However, in the year 2012, UGC gave one-time bulk grant to JNU under the 12th plan for five years from which an extra amount was allocated for the next five years. Now that the 12th plan has ended, the library is running with its regular annual grant,” he said, adding that the university has approached the University Grants Commission (UGC) for additional funds for the library.
Replying to the clarification, the JNU Students’ Union alleged that university hid the fact that it got Rs 20 crore for five years, and wondered whether the JNU Vice Chancellor, who is also a UGC member, objected to the library fund cut decision by the Commission.
“The case is clear– library used to have an annual budget of Rs 7-8 crore which administration used to spend from various sources. Now, if one source has dried up or closed, isn’t it the responsibility of the administration to push for alternatives as soon as possible?
“It is important to note that JNU VC Mamidala Jagadesh Kumar is a member of UGC, so if UGC has cut down the funding why didn’t he dissent then? Or was he part of the decision taken to reduce funding for library?” union president N. Sai Balaji said in a statement.
Race for Statues
In recent time, there has been a sort of competition among ruling parties in several states to install statues of personalities of thier choice from the Indian history.
Last month, the BJP government in Gujarat installed the statue of Sardar Patel. It was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The stateBJP government of Maharashtra is working on the statue of Shiva Ji in Mumbai. The Yogi Adityanath government of Uttar Pradesh has also announced to construct a tall statue of Ram in Ayodhya.
— With Inputs From IANS
