IIT-Madras spreading hatred, says Arundhati Roy

CHENNAI: In the wake of the IIT-Madras temporarily derecognizing a student group for criticizing Prime Minister Narendra Modi, activist Arundhati Roy on Saturday questioned the action of the institution.
In a statement, the celebrated author said, “What is it about a student organisation, the Ambedkar-Periyar Study Circle (APSC) that frightened the dean of students of the IIT Madras enough for him to unilaterally ‘derecognize’ it”?
She said the reason given is the usual "idiotic red herring" that they were spreading hatred among communities.Another reason they were given, students say, is that the name of their organisation was considered to be too ‘political’. The same does not apply obviously to other student organisations such as the Vivekananda Study Circle, said Roy.
She said at a time when Hindutva organisations are outrageously celebrating Ambedkar the man who publicly denounced Hinduism, as though he is their very own man, at a time when the Hindu Nationalists’ campaign of Ghar Wapsi (a revamped version of the Arya Samaj’s ‘Shuddhi’ programme) has been launched to get dalits to return to the “Hindu Fold’, why is it that when Ambedkar’s real followers use the name or likeness of Ambedkar they get murdered like Surekha Bhotmange’s family in Kahirlanji?
“Why is it that if a dalit man has a ring tone on his phone with a song about Ambedkar he gets beaten to death? Why has the APSC been derecognized? It is because they have seen through this charade and have put their finger on the most dangerous possible place,” she said.
“They have made the connection between corporate globalisation and the perpetuation of caste. There is hardly anything more threatening to this present ruling establishment than doing what APSC did—celebrating both Bhagat Singh and Ambedkar,” Roy said.
This is what has brought them into the line of fire. This is what is sought to be quashed. The derecognition of APSC is a recognition of a kind. It is a recognition that it is absolutely right to make the connections it makes. And that many are beginning to make those connections, the author said.