NEW DELHI (The Thursday Times) — An Uttar Pradesh minister has described Aligarh Muslim University and Jamia Millia Islamia as “hotbeds of terrorism” and said he would shut both if he got the chance, drawing demands for his sacking from a students’ body and condemnation from a Muslim cleric.
“Look, these are hotbeds of terrorism. If I ever get the chance in my lifetime, I will first get Aligarh Muslim University and Delhi’s Jamia Millia Islamia shut down,” Thakur Raghuraj Singh, a minister of state in the Uttar Pradesh government, said in an interview on Tuesday.
“They are funded by Hindu taxpayers, through our tax money, yet traitors are being nurtured here. Traitors and terrorists are being produced here,” he said.
Singh, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party, also attacked former Vice-President Hamid Ansari, a former vice-chancellor of AMU, and said such people should go to “Iran, Sudan or wherever they feel comfortable”.
Calls for his removal
The Jammu and Kashmir Students Association demanded Singh’s immediate removal from the state council of ministers, a police case against him, and a time-bound investigation into his remarks. It urged the BJP’s national leadership and the Uttar Pradesh chief minister to condemn the statement.
“It is disturbing that instead of addressing the pressing challenges confronting India’s education sector, an elected representative is busy demonising universities, branding their students as potential terrorists and threatening to shut down institutions because of their names and identities,” the association’s national convenor, Nasir Khuehami, said in a statement.
He said the two universities had contributed to India’s freedom struggle and its intellectual life, and warned that branding students as potential terrorists because of where they study could deepen alienation and legitimise prejudice.
Maulana Khalid Rashid Firangi Mahli, chairman of the Islamic Centre of India, also condemned the remarks. “Whether it is AMU or Jamia, these are centres of education. Both universities bring India recognition around the world,” he said. “There is a shortage of education in the country, so rather than making such statements, we should promote education.”
Two central universities
AMU, in Aligarh in western Uttar Pradesh, and Jamia, in New Delhi, are both central universities funded by the federal government. AMU grew out of a college founded in 1875 and became a university in 1920, the same year Jamia was founded.
The reports carried no response to the demands from the BJP or the Uttar Pradesh government.
