Rohith Vemula was not a dalit, says minister Sushma Swaraj

mangaloretoday.com

Hyderabad, Jan 31:  Hyderabad University research scholar Rohith Vemula, who committed suicide earlier this month, was not a Dalit, External affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has said.

"The facts have come out in the case and as per as my knowledge, that student (Rohith) was not a Dalit," she said in Thane adding that the controversy over his caste was "baseless".

Rohith hung himself days after he and four Dalit students were suspended by the university, allegedly for assaulting an activist of the ABVP, a student body with close links to the BJP, in August.

 

His suicide stirred a political and public uproar, with students and the opposition alleging that he was persecuted by caste discrimination.

A month before his suicide, Rohith wrote to Professor P Appa Rao, the Vice Chancellor of the university, asking him to give poison or "a nice rope" to Dalit students. In the letter, he identified himself repeatedly as a member of "(the) Dalit self-respect movement" and suggested the persecution on campus for "students like me" was so widespread that the campus should facilitate euthanasia.

An Andhra Pradesh revenue department certificate established that Mr Vemula belonged to the Mala community, listed as a Scheduled Caste or Dalits. But his paternal grandmother has said that the family belongs to the Vadderas, categorised under Other Backward Castes or OBCs.

Rohith’s mother told NDTV that while she belongs to the Mala community of Dalits, her husband is a Vaddera. She said Rohith identified himself as a Dalit. ’’I bought up my children identifying them as Dalit as their father left me when my third child was still in my womb.’’

The university has revoked the suspension of Rohith’s companions, but protesting students have rejected it, demanding that Professor P Appa Rao and Union Ministers Bandaru Dattatreya and Minister Smriti Irani be sacked.

Professor P Appa Rao, who has been named in a police complaint in Rohith’s death, has gone on an indefinite leave. Minister Dattatreya, also named in the police case, has been accused of writing to Education Minister Smriti Irani seeking action against the research scholar and his companions for "anti-national activities."

Yesterday, Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi joined student protesters in a mass hunger strike at the university and targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the end of his fast. "My main opposition to the Prime Minister and the RSS is that they are trying to crush the spirit of Indian students and youngsters by imposing one idea from the top," he said.

The BJP has said Mr Gandhi was "politicizing" the death of the research scholar and "playing politics on dead bodies".