Vile linguistic communalism

The faculty of Sanskrit Vidya Dhara Vigyan at Banaras Hindu University (BHU) has reopened but the assistant professor, Feroze Khan, has not been allowed to take classes. The young Sanskrit scholar, appointed to the job this month, is mystified that his religion is being held against him. As students continue to deny the professor his right to teach, the case has become an extreme example of Islamophobia in young people whose idealism alone should have pointed out to them as to how wrong they are.

What is being played out is a reflection of a microcosm of prejudice and hate that is quite illogical, especially in a country with an ancient civilisation which held knowledge to be so precious that the learned were the ones who were revered and placed at the very top of the totem pole, even in the old, despicable caste system. In egalitarian modern India, knowledge should be even more respected as to be way above caste, creed or religion. Knowledge, like data, is the new oil in a changing world.

Faculty members and students of other departments have shown up the protests against the professor to be shallow and misplaced. But that has not helped the university impose discipline on errant students even as Mr Khan seeks answers to queries like what teaching Sanskrit sahitya (literature) has to do with religion or even the Vedas or Dharma Shastra.

On display is crude prejudice propelled by narrow-minded politics of “Hindu” and “Hindutva” when we should have been celebrating such a great moment reflecting India’s pluralism in a Muslim professor of Sanskrit teaching young minds not only the language but also the diversity of the country. A section of lumpen students with a political agenda should be put in their place by ensuring that Feroze Khan takes classes. But we fear we already know how this one will pan out.