We, the undersigned faculty members of JNU, express deep shock and dismay at the news that a complaint of rape has been lodged against a JNU student Anmol Ratan (an activist of a left students organisation but since then expelled from it), by another student of JNU. We express our support and solidarity for the complainant and request the JNU community, the administration, and the GSCASH to ensure that the due process of law is allowed to proceed without any hindrance.
It is of primary importance that the health and safety of the complainant be at the centre of all that the university community and the JNU administration does. This necessitates swift action to ensure that the accused (or those acting on his behalf) do not have any opportunity to intimidate, slander, or harm the complainant or the complainant’s witnesses, tamper with evidence or testimony, or otherwise create a campus environment that indulges in victim blaming or casting aspersions on the motives of the complainant.
We are therefore extremely dismayed to know that more than 48 hours after the complaint has been lodged, the accused has yet to be suspended or declared out of bounds from the university, so that safe conditions of complaint and testimony for the complainant may be maintained. We demand that this be done forthwith. This failure to act has tarnished the image of the JNU administration quite severely.
We also recognize the manner in which over the decades, teachers and students have made JNU a space in which women generally feel safe, and also empowered to report cases of sexual violence when these occur. This atmosphere however, has been caricatured in the recent past by sections of the media and by right-wing individuals as one of irresponsible sexual license, which the JNU administration has done nothing to counter.
We are dismayed also by the instrumental use of this case by some organizations on campus to further their political ambitions.
The JNU administration must undertake to cover all medical and legal costs of the complainant. It must fully cooperate with the investigation. So must all other members of the JNU community, as they are likely to have information relevant to the case and conduct of the accused.
As JNU faculty, we reiterate our commitment to building a campus that is safe, democratic, secular and mindful of the dignity of all sections of our community.
Signed:
Mohan Rao
Rohit
Ayesha Kidwai
Nivedita Menon
Madhu Sahni
Ranjani Mazumdar
V Sujatha
Ritoo Jerath
Supriya Varma
Lata Singh
Shambhavi Prakash
Rajarshi Dasgupta
Ameet Parameswaran
Vikas Bajpai
C.P. Chandrasekhar
Rajat Datta
Parnal Chirmuley
Mohinder Singh
Veena Hariharan
Mallarika Sinha Roy
Jayati Ghosh
Pratiksha Baxi
Navaneetha Mokkil
Janaki Nair
Kumkum Roy
Brahm Prakash
Pradeep Shinde
Sharad
Burton Cleetus
Bishnupriya Paul
Shikha Jhingan
Kamal Mitra Chenoy
Rajan Kumar
Amitabh Singh
B.K.Choudhary
Ajay Kumar Kamati
Brinda Bose
Vikas Rawal
Sucharita Sen
Papori Bora
Chitra Harshvardhan
Vinay Kumar Ambedkar
Sima Baidya
Shiva Prakash
Shukla Sawant
Ravi Srivastava
Surajit Das
Surinder Jodhka
Kaustav Banerjee
Ira Bhaskar
Tiplut Nongbri
Rajesh Paswan
Ganga Sahay Meena
Sachidanand Sinha
Pradipta Bandyopadhyay
Tanweer Fazal
P.Bilimale
Garima Dalal
Saradindu Bhaduri
Sucheta Mahajan
Archana Prasad
Sudhir Kumar
Nilika Mehrotra
Joy L.K. Pachuau
Neera Kongari
Mollica Dastider
Deepak K Mishra
Biswajit Dhar
Padmini Pani
Dhruv Raina
Niraja Gopal Jayal
Moushumi Basu
GJV Prasad
Saumen Chattopadhyay
Sabaree Mitra
R. Ramaswamy
Debashis Ghoshal
Renuka Singh
Rosina Nasir
Udaya Kumar
Indrani Mukherjee
In spite of frequent abuse of bail and parole by rapers ,the SC grants them bail and invariably they either buy the witnesses and they turn hostile. or destroy evidence and they go scot free, or throw acid , rape the victim again and boast of not getting any punishment .these occurrences make other criminals bold and ie why these crimes are not reduced but are increased .
So courts and especially police must be sensitized .