The Valley’s Silence Begins Young On Kashmir's College Campuses

The wide hall of Gandhi Bhawan at Kashmir University (KU) was dimly lit, filled with students and experts talking about the everyday existential issues that plague the city and its dwellers. A few blocks away, political science students walked to their class, exchanging complaints that could have been conventionally raised through the aegis of a student association. But at the varsity campus, there is none.

Twenty-two-year-old headscarf-clad Rifat Mir, a political science student at KU, fumed at the discomfort that students staying in the hostel had to endure after additional beds were placed inside their rooms. Another student rued that there was no student association to counsel new students on how to adjust to campus life and also cope with the thought that they would have to struggle hard for jobs once they completed their studies.

At KU, students have been learning about and discussing wider issues such as traffic jams in Srinagar city, but they are barred from engaging in political activity through a students’ association on campus. “There is a de facto ban on forming a students’ union. I think an association is important to bring before the KU authorities issues such as the shortage of space in hostels,” says Mir.

Jawaz Bashir, another political science student, chips in, arguing for the need for a student-run platform through which they could understand why the benefits of better funding to the university after a higher NAAC ranking did not help in improving the facilities for students. “An association is a must to give a democratic voice to the issues of students, which is not there,” he says, adding that alternate forums, such as the vice chancellor’s meet-up with students twice a year, were of little help in resolving the immediate issues that confronted them.

In Kashmir, political activities on the campuses of colleges and universities remain missing as the authorities have previously banned the operation of student unions that fanned separatist activities. Prior to the revocation of Article 370 on August 5, 2019, which scrapped Kashmir’s special status, students had been routinely resorting to stone-pelting against the security forces during protests that emerged over incidents of human rights violations. However, for the last six years and more, the student activism on campuses has been particularly missing.

At KU, students talked about how a political awakening through an organised union remains missing on the campus. “The way the body needs a soul and veins need blood, a university needs a students’ association,” says Aamir Mushtaq, an English literature student, while stressing that the students’ body was required for issues such as holding counselling sessions for new students to help them overcome academic stress.

Nasir Khuehami, National Convenor of the J&K Students Association (JKSA), says that the ban on unions on campuses ensures that there are no such bodies to take up student-related issues in educational institutions here. He adds that the JKSA was started in Uttarakhand, where it began work by opposing the attack on Kashmiri students by some right-wing groups, before it became active in Kashmir in 2020. “There are no unions in the colleges and universities. Even the student wings of the political parties don’t exist on the campuses,” he adds.

Earlier in February this year, in reply to a Right to Information (RTI) application filed by the JKSA about the ban on student politics at KU, the authorities noted that the students’ union had been banned in 2009 following the verbal directions of the then vice-chancellor, keeping in view the “prevailing security scenario in Kashmir” and “apprehensions that students might be influenced by individuals with ulterior motives, potentially leading to destabilisation and disruption of the academic environment on campus.”

The KU authorities further said that there was no pressing need for a students’ union as the university has a transparent mechanism for grievance redressal. “A dedicated Students’ Grievance Cell has been established to receive representations from students and to provide redressal in a time-bound manner. Additionally, each department has constituted a departmental committee to address students’ issues and concerns at the local level,” the KU said in its official reply.

KU Registrar, Professor Naseer Iqbal, says that instead of a students’ union, they have a Class Representative Forum, which has class representatives from different departments who bring student issues to the notice of University authorities. “Instead of a union or association, we have this CR Forum, which raises matters with the Dean of Student Welfare, and then the administration finds solutions to the student issues,” he says.

Due to the ban, regional political parties like the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) do not have student wings, the National Conference (NC) has an inactive one, and those of the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) do not operate on the campuses. Political leaders say that with curbs continuing on protests against the government following the revocation of Article 370, making student organisations operational on campuses, following the dip in militant violence, remains a remote possibility.

Senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Monga says there was a sense of fear among students that any form of protest on campuses would be dealt with sternly by the authorities. “Due to the volatile situation in Kashmir, organised student unions on the campuses were less visible, and the restrictions have become more severe after the revocation of Kashmir’s special status,” he says.

NC chief spokesperson, Tanvir Sadiq, says that in the last six years, the office bearers of the National Conference Students Union (NCSU) were taken into the youth wing, and they are looking at reviving it. “Currently, the NCSU doesn’t have any office bearers, but we are looking at reviving it. There is a ban on the formation of independent student organisations at KU, which should not have been there,” he says.

According to the BJP spokesperson Manzoor Bhat, the party does not have any active student organisations in the colleges and universities in Kashmir.

Former Minister and senior PDP leader Nayeem Akhtar says that due to the ban on student politics, the PDP doesn’t have functioning student organisations in college and university campuses. “In Jammu and Kashmir, the student agitations have been very fierce, but the organised electoral student activity has been missing on the campuses. This is due to the ban on political activity of students. In the rest of the country, educational institutions have been forums that have produced strong leaders nationally and also at the local level, such as in municipalities,” he says.

However, the bans have not stopped students from rising up in protest. Last year, within months of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah assuming office, hundreds of students flooded the roads seeking that the government increase the job percentage for candidates in the open merit category. The protests, which were supported by all parties, including the PDP and the NC’s own MP Aga Ruhulla, forced Abdullah to constitute a cabinet sub-committee to frame a report on the issue to avert the first major challenge to his government, which was elected after six years of President’s rule.

Civil society activist Imtiyaz Chasti, who lent support to the student protests, has now joined active politics and is part of the People’s Conference as one of its secretaries. Chasti says that the government has, however, failed to carry out “the rationalisation of reservations in Jammu and Kashmir.” He notes, “It was a movement that was started by students to seek a reservation proportionate to the population of different groups, but the government has done nothing. The cabinet sub-committee forwarded its report to the Law Department, but the issue has not been resolved.”

Students feel that the associations or unions are required not only to shape their political ideology, but also to provide them with a platform to raise issues like fee hikes. Danish Bhat, an LLB student at KU, says that an association is needed to highlight their issues, such as the rescheduling of exam dates during inclement weather. A research scholar recalls how they felt the need for a students’ association when the university increased the admission fee. “A few years back, the university increased the fee, we launched a protest, and the students came together to seek a rollback. It was a spontaneous protest. We don’t have any association here to frequently take up issues,” he says, wishing to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal from the authorities.

Talib Hussain Bhat, 23, a KU student, says that the Facebook page of the students’ association of the university has become inactive after it posted about the protests over the death of a university faculty member who became a militant in 2018. “The activities related to student politics are missing on the campus,” he says.

Ishfaq Naseem is senior special correspondent, Outlook. He is based in Srinagar.

This story appeared as 'The Valley’s Silence Begins Young', Outlook’s November 1 issue, Out Of Syllabus, which explored how the spirit of questioning, debate, and dissent—the lifeblood of true education—is being stifled in universities across the country, where conformity is prized over curiosity, protests are curtailed, and critical thinking is replaced by rote learning, raising urgent questions about the future of student agency, intellectual freedom, and democratic engagement.