In 2005, he urged the then V-C to be lenient with protesting Left students, quoted French philosopher Voltaire to defend their right to dissent
New Delhi: Erudite and soft-spoken, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh developed his reputation as a consensus builder during his stint as the Finance Minister who opened the doors for economic reform in India.
But it was his intervention to prevent the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) administration from acting against students who had held a protest against him in 2005 that showcased a fresh dimension of his persona. Visiting the JNU campus to unveil a statue of former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Singh was shown black flags by Left-backed students.
The incident led to the university issuing showcause notices to the students, with a few of them even being detained by the Delhi Police. A day later, Singh intervened, suggesting to the then Vice-Chancellor BB Bhattacharya to be lenient with the students.
During his visit to the campus, known for its strong anti-establishment stance, Singh had quoted the French philosopher Voltaire, saying, “I may disagree with what you have to say but I shall defend to the death your right to say it.”
“Every member of a university community, if he or she wishes to aspire to be worthy of the university, must accept the truth of Voltaire’s classic statement. Voltaire proclaimed ‘I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death, your right to say it’. That idea must be the cornerstone of a liberal institution,” Singh had said in his speech.
Recalling the incident, a retired JNU professor said, “The students waved black flags at him. The-then Vice-Chancellor received a call from the PMO (Prime Minister’s Office), asking him to be lenient with the students as holding protests was their right. The students were then let off with a warning.”
JNU has been an epicentre of protests in the past decade, with the 2016 sedition controversy triggering a debate about freedom of speech and expression on campus. Bhattarcharya in 2016 recalled the 2005 incident during an interview. “Manmohan Singh had told me ‘please be lenient, sir’. I said I have to at least warn them… but the problem today is that lines of communication with students have broken down,” he had said.
Bollywood actor and JNU alumna Swara Bhaskar recalled that she was a student at the university when the incident took place. “I remember an anecdote from when then prime minister Manmohan Singh came to JNU. I was a student there. I think Singur, Nandigram had happened or perhaps it was an ‘anti-Naxal’ operation in CG (Chhattisgarh). There was talk of campus protests. Of course there was lots of security but the Left student organisations, probably AISA or DSU, hung black flags all over campus and two left students managed to disrupt the Prime Minister’s speech with sloganeering and showing black flags,” Bhaskar said in a post on X.
