The threat of turning the autonomous Maharaja’s College into a fertile ground for spreading the politics of fear has emerged stronger with the brutal murder of a 20-year-old undergraduate student and leader of the Students Federation of India (SFI) here on Sunday midnight.
Despite witnessing several clashes involving rival student outfits since its inception, people like K.S. Radhakrishnan, former chairman of the Public Service Commission and Principal of the college, could not recall a single incident when a student was killed in this manner. “I had witnessed several student clashes during my association with Maharaja’s spanning over three decades. But not of the kind that occurred today where an innocent boy was stabbed to death,” he said.
Blaming extremist outfits for using violence against opponents, Dr. Radhakrishnan alleged that organisations such as the Campus Front were propagating an agenda through which they wanted to convey to students on campuses across the State that “you will be killed, if you oppose us”.
“Extremism functions on the belief that might is right and it demands that you earn maximum strength through weapons. This has come at a time when Maharaja’s is returning to normalcy after long. The killing of Abhimanyu could also be seen as an attempt to denigrate the prestigious institution which has been offering higher education, especially to students belonging to the weaker sections of the society,” he said.
T. Jayachandran, member of the College Development Council and the Maharaja’s Old Students Association, recalled that the only murder associated with Maharaja’s College occurred in 1973 and the victim was not a student.
“Muthukoya, a resident of Lakshadweep who had come to visit students from the island, was killed by goons near the Hospital Road. It was a case of mistaken identity as Muthukoya bore resemblance to T.M. Thomas Isaac, Finance Minister, who was then an SFI leader at Maharaja’s. The gang had come in search of Dr. Isaac following tension between KSU and SFI activists,” he said.
Stating that the killing of Abhimanyu had dented the years of efforts to elevate the academic and infrastructure capabilities of the college, Mr. Jayachandran pointed out that the killers were clear that spreading terror on Maharaja’s College campus would have its reflections on other campuses in the State. “The attempt is to spread fear and force good students to stay away from the only autonomous college in the government sector in the State,” he said.
K.G. Sankara Pillai, noted poet and former Principal, said that the campus had never witnessed violence of this kind. “By doing so, those encouraging terror are trying to convey to others that they would go to any extent to spread their ideology. They are killing democratic, vibrant and creative spaces like the Maharaja’s campus as part of this violence,” he said.
Simon Britto, former CPI (M) MLA, who defined Abhimanyu as a good student coming from an economically weaker family, alleged that radical outfits wanted to become active in Maharaja’s, which has always been a stronghold of the Left. “That’s why they brought people from outside to carry out the brutal murder,” he said.