Bengaluru: Students, activists and cultural figures Sunday raised concerns over “shrinking of democratic space in educational institutions”, paper leaks, “weakening public education system” and the wider challenges confronting young people.The issues were discussed at ‘GenZ on the March: Paper Leak, Accountability, and the New Wave of Youth Politics in India’, organised by the All India Students’ Association (Aisa) and Revolutionary Youth Association (RYA).Addressing the gathering, Aisa national president Neha Bora, who recently was on a 23-day hunger strike in Delhi demanding the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan as Union education minister, said the closure of govt schools had consequences extending far beyond the institutions.“The closure of govt schools doesn’t just mean that a dysfunctional school with a few dozen students is closed down,” she said.Bora also alleged that while the state govt had expressed solidarity with student protesters in Delhi, its response to similar protests in Bengaluru had been markedly different, with FIRs filed and students detained. She referenced Karnataka’s BJP-RSS support base, making light of the reaction to student mobilisation elsewhere in the country, before extending solidarity from Bengaluru to student movements in Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.She said political parties positioning themselves against BJP must demonstrate what genuinely pro-student politics meant rather than limiting themselves to symbolic expressions of support.As part of its campaign, Aisa launched a petition demanding that Azim Premji University preserve democratic spaces on campus and revoke restrictions and suspensions imposed on students.Actor Kishore said the lack of basic facilities in govt schools should itself provoke public concern. “Our govt schools don’t have proper toilets, classrooms, libraries or drinking water. That must cause unrest,” he said, adding that the campaign must also confront caste and economic inequalities that continue within classrooms.Musician and author TM Krishna rejected the idea that students could remain outside politics.Aisa said it would organise solidarity programmes across campuses on Sep 5, the death anniversary of journalist Gauri Lankesh.
