On Sunday, September 17, Santishree Dhulipudi Pandit, Vice-Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), raised questions on the working of the Supreme Court. She pondered whether would SC treat others as it did when it granted relief to activist Teesta Setalvad on a Saturday night.
The JNU VC was referring to the Supreme Court’s grant of interim protection from arrest to Setalvad on July 1 in a case concerning evidence falsification to frame innocent individuals in 2002 post-Godhra riot cases.
“The Leftist ecosystem still exists. You know, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court opened the court on a Saturday night to give Teesta Setalvad bail. Will it happen for us,” she asked while at the launch of a Marathi book named ‘Jagala Pokharnari Davi Walvi’ (World-weakening Leftist Termites) in Pune.
Pandit has a long association with Pune as she was a lecturer in the Political Science department of Maharashtra’s Savitribai Phule Pune University. “To retain political power, you need (to have) narrative power. We need to have it. Unless we attain it, we will be like a directionless ship,” she said.
During the address, she also said that she was associated with RSS-affiliated organizations in her childhood years. “I was a Bal Sevika’ in my childhood. I got my sanskaras (values) from the RSS only. I am proud to say that I belong to the Sangh (RSS) and I am proud to say that I am a Hindu. I do not hesitate at all. Garv se kehti hu main Hindu hoon,” she repeated as the audience shouted the slogans of ‘Jai Shri Ram’.
“Left and RSS are individual ideologies. There has been a major paradigm shift post-2014 in the conflict between these two ideologies,” she said.
Pandit, who was appointed as JNU VC in February last year, stated that some individuals objected to her choice to display the national flag and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s photograph on campus.
Pandit asserted she informed them they were eating free meals on campus paid for by taxpayers and that they should bow before the national flag and PM Modi’s portrait.
“Until I went to JNU, there was no photo of PM Modi, the President of India, or the national flag. Many people told me not to bring (them) on the campus. I told them you enjoy free meals here with taxpayers’ money, bow before them. He is the prime minister of the country. He does not belong to any party. More than a year has passed and nobody has protested against it,” she said.
In reference to the upcoming Nalanda University in Bihar, she stated, “I recently visited the Nalanda University at Bakhtiyarpur.” We should modify the name of Bakhtiyarpur. That’s a strange name.”
“Our Bharatiya civilization is superior, feminist, and the greatest in the world,” she said as she remarked on the country’s ancient civilization. “Draupadi is the first feminist and not one Simone De Beauvoir (French philosopher). Our civilization is nature-centric,” she said.
On July 1, a 3-judge bench of the Supreme Court granted interim bail to controversial activist Teesta Setalvad. A bench of Justices BR Gavai, AS Bopanna, and Dipankar Datta was hearing the case. The larger 3-judge bench was formed minutes after a 2-judge bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Prashant Kumar Mishra failed to arrive at a consensus on the appeal challenging the Gujarat High Court order refusing regular bail.
As reported earlier, the 3-judge bench was formed within minutes, and the hearing was scheduled at 9.15 p.m. CJI Chandrachud, who was watching a Bharatnatyam performance at that time, got up multiple times and ensured the formation of a larger bench for the sake of Teesta Satalvad’s bail hearing.
