The Kerala Students Union (KSU) found itself in a politically awkward situation after mobile phone videos of late-night revelry followed by fisticuffs at a political study camp on the outskirts of Thiruvananthapuram swamped the mainstream and social media on Sunday.
At least two camp participants were hospitalised with injuries, prompting the State police to launch a probe.
The video showed smashed windows and a blood-stained floor at the camp venue, the Congress-owned Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Development Studies, near Neyyar Dam.
Dance and fisticuff
The video, which triggered a surge of mocking memes and trolls on social media, revealed KSU workers engaged in a vigorous dance. The bonhomie at the camp seemed to end abruptly. Wobbly video images captured by some camp members showed chaotic scenes of skirmishing KSU workers.
The videos of KSU workers making a spectacle of themselves caught the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) leadership off guard. KPCC president K. Sudhakaran has constituted a party commission to investigate the incident. The KPCC has also put the camp on hold.
Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan inaugurated the camp on Saturday. Its stated aim was to inculcate leadership and organisational skills to increase KSU’s political footprint on campuses and create a young demographic the Congress could later draw on to replenish its ranks.
The fighting reportedly broke out hours after the study classes for the day ended at night.
Mr. Satheesan told reporters in Kochi that the leadership awaited the enquiry commission’s report for further action.
KPCC general secretary M.M. Nasir, an enquiry commission member, said a spat between KSU workers from different WhatsApp groups had led to the violence at the camp.
KSU State president Aloshious Xavier termed media coverage of the incident absurd and a travesty of the truth.
‘Organisational indiscipline’
The fracas lent potent political ammunition to the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] to assail the KSU and retard the Congress campaign against Students’ Federation of India’s (SFI) “stranglehold“ on campuses. Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) national president A.A. Rahim, MP, and SFI State president M. Arsho argued that the violence revealed the Congress and the KSU’s “organisational indiscipline, political feuding, one-upmanship riven leadership and mafia culture”.
