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Notice (8): Undefined variable: urlPrefix [APP/Template/Layout/printlayout.ctp, line 8]latest-news-updates/attack-on-beef-fest-against-food-fascism-gs-radhakrishna-14490.html"/> LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Attack on beef fest against ‘food fascism’-GS Radhakrishna | Im4change.org
Resource centre on India's rural distress
 
 

Attack on beef fest against ‘food fascism’-GS Radhakrishna
-The Telegraph
 
A student was stabbed and injured last night as violence flared at Osmania University over a “beef festival” organised by Dalit students to assert their right to eat their traditional food on the campus.

The government, worried that the issue may snowball and re-ignite the Telangana movement at its epicentre, has swamped the campus with paramilitary and police who caned the fighting students and fired tear gas. Still, skirmishes continued this morning and classes were closed.

Satyanarayana, a member of BJP student wing ABVP which allegedly tried to disrupt the festival last evening by throwing stones at the diners, was attacked and stabbed past midnight at his hostel. His wounds are not grievous, hospital doctors said.

Dalit student bodies — some of them pro-Telangana — organised the festival with support from Left student groups in protest against the “food fascism” that keeps beef out of campus canteens. Dalit students allege they are taunted by their upper caste peers for eating beef at home.

Ironically, a beef stall has been a regular feature — and a major attraction — at the annual fest, Sukoon, of the nearby University of Hyderabad since 2006 and nobody objects to it.

Last evening, as beef biryani was being served at Osmania to 200-odd people — including students, teachers and rights activists who had been invited — a group of about 50 students, allegedly from the ABVP, arrived and hurled stones.

This triggered overnight sticks-and-stones battles on the campus, leaving six students injured and several vehicles, including a state bus and a media van, in flames. All the roads leading to the university have been sealed.

The issue has been resonating on Twitter since yesterday, with festival supporters and opponents bashing each other in 140 characters. Writer and Dalit rights activist Meena Kandasamy, an invitee to the festival, tweeted how she had to be escorted out in a police vehicle.

Last year, too, Osmania’s Dalit students had planned a beef festival but were dissuaded. With their number growing from 1,200 in 2011 to 2,000 this year, they were more determined this time.

Vice-chancellor S. Satyanarayana said he had not been approached for permission and asserted the event could not be allowed given the history of caste tensions on the campus. However, the organisers pooh-poohed the idea that holding such an event required permission.

They received support from P.L. Vishweshwar Rao, a former professor of communications and journalism at the university, who said students had the right to eat a particular food. He said the police and the university administration had failed to protect the students participating in the festival.

“Beef is a basic Dalit food. We want this upper caste hostility towards it to end,” said Kancha Ilaiah, a Dalit ideologue who teaches at the university.

Some 200kg of beef was bought for the festival, organised by the Telangana Students’ Association, Progressive Democratic Students’ Union, the CPM-affiliated SFI and students from the English and Foreign Languages University across the street.

The guest list of activists included Ilaiah, S. Simhadri, Gali Vinod Kumar, Vishweshwar Rao, Hangya Bhukya, Gogu Shyamala and G. Aloysius.

A couple of days ago, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad had said the festival would be opposed on the ground of hurting religious sentiments.