The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Activism is more social than political

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Monday, Nov 24, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Activism is more social than political

Sruthi Krishnan

“Irrespective of political parties’ influences, students can raise issues as a class”

— FILE PHOTO

POLITICAL OR APOLITICAL? Some students prefer being part of civil society organisations rather than being part of political parties. A few, however, refrain from both, say students.

CHENNAI: “Joining politics never crossed my mind,” says K.L. Charanya, a student of architecture at the Measi Academy of Architecture. When she decided to act for the environment, she chose to join Youth for Social Change, a civil society organisation.

There are many students like Charanya who prefer civil society organisations to politics as a platform for change.

Aashish Gupta, a student of IIT-M’s humanities department, says, “I wanted something independent of a political party, which did not have a political incentive,” explaining why he chose to join the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) rather than a political party. The assumption that political power is needed to effect change is incorrect, “We as citizens also have power,” he says.

Rupesh Kumar, a student of the Madras School of Social Work, says that he sees politics as something that needs to be “dealt with rather than join with.” Civil society organisations are more in sync with his ideas, he says. If a party’s stance on issues close to his heart is the same as his, “I’ll be a sympathiser rather than a party worker,” he adds.

Third group

But the entire student community is not divided into those who prefer to join civil society organisations and those who prefer mainstream politics. There is a third group that is immersed in planning for their own future.

V. Padma, a teacher in Stella Maris College, says that the number of students actively involved in social issues “is not encouraging, but there are people,” who want to be involved.

Recalling the time she was a student, she says that apart from party-based struggles, there were student forums and study circles where students took the lead “driven by a voluntary desire to respond to events that occurred around them.” In the current situation, she says that the pressure for eking a career has taken over the thought of “what can I do for a cause.”

Instead of thinking about social issues, many students delve into themselves, says G. Chandrasekaran, Principal, Government College of Fine Arts. “If they feel passionately about social issues, it will find expression in their work,” he says. Instead, he says, their creations are involved with their personal life and emotions rather than their role as social beings. “They have a fantasy, a beautiful world of their own,” which he says reflects in their art. “They say no one understands me, and so I am in a different world.”

R. Geetha, a trade union activist, says that students have another alternative, which is not much visible in Chennai.

“Irrespective of party influences, students can raise issues as a class, which is a democratic movement of students,” she says.

“The attitude of making every process democratic can bridge discrimination and bring social equality.”

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