JNUSU ‘s friend Nitish, the democratically elected President of the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union (JNUSU), has been taken to Safdarjung Hospital after suffering severe chest pain after days of having undergone an indefinite hunger strike—a stark reminder of the physical toll inflicted by prolonged neglect and authoritarian disregard. His condition must not be viewed in isolation but as the direct result of the systemic apathy displayed towards the legitimate and urgent needs of the student community.
The Struggle Behind the Strike
JNU students have been agitating for weeks now against the high-handedness of the administration, increasing fees, the dismantling of democratic institutions, and efforts to muzzle dissenting voices on campus. The strike, called after many attempts at dialogue failed, is a manifestation of the desperation of students and the failure of institutional mechanisms to address their issues. Students from all departments have stood united, resisting police harassment, administrative intimidation, and academic action, to assert their constitutional and moral right: accessible and affordable education, participatory democracy, and a university untroubled by ideological pressure.
Administrative Apathy and Mounting Crisis
The hunger strike, initiated by JNUSU under Nitish’s leadership, has reached its penultimate stage with many students facing worsening health conditions. But rather than responding with compassion and resolution, the administration has used a tactics of silence and aggression—refusing to open a line of negotiation or even recognize the legitimacy of student demands. By failing to assume responsibility, they have pushed the crisis to life-threatening proportions. Comrade Nitish’s hospitalization is also not merely a matter of medical distress but a political issue, precipitating the very immediate questions of the price students have to pay to be heard in their own universities.
Core Demands of the Students
The students’ community has made a number of demands which involve the cancellation of the indiscriminate suspension of students, restoration of the university’s focus on cheap hostels and mess facilities, stopping all privatization of basic services, and re-establishing democratic values in student representation and policymaking. These are not extreme demands—it is simply the fundamental rights protecting the very concept of a public educational institution.

JNU as a Symbol of Democratic Resistance
What is going on in JNU today is a microcosm of a larger trend across Indian universities, where students are being seen more and more as obstacles to be overcome, not as stakeholders. The suffocation of discussion, monitoring of political activity, and force-feeding of top-down decisions are all constituent elements of a project of depoliticization and erasure of the campus legacy of resistance. JNU, once held up as a citadel of dissent and democratic participation, is being aggressively remoulded to meet the needs of a bureaucratic and ideological elite that is largely unconcerned with the lives of the very students it professes to serve.
The Urgent Need for Action
That Comrade Nitish was forced to resort to hunger strike for fundamental demands to be heard—and continue to be disregarded—is a testament to the extent of democratic decay within the academic environment. In the past few days, teachers, alumni, and rights activists have started raising alarm over the university administration’s unwillingness to listen, and there have been calls for the Ministry of Education and independent human rights monitors to immediately step in. While students congregate outside Safdarjung Hospital in vigil and protest, they are not just standing for Nitish—they are standing for all students whose voice has been silenced, whose future has been commodified, and whose right to query is being outlawed. The administration needs to be held responsible for the health crisis it has engineered, and urgent measures need to be taken to fulfill student demands. The silence must break. Justice needs to be delivered—not in the wake of a tragedy, but in its prevention. We call on the university administration, the media, civil society, and all democratic forces to see this moment for what it is: a crossroads. The life of a student leader must not be put at risk for inquiring into what should be taken for granted—dignity, dialogue, and democratic education.
Also Read : https://www.jnu.ac.in/
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