The students of FTII have been waging an inspiring and a determined struggle against the sub-standard, partisan and saffronized appointments in FTII for almost 2 months now. These include appointment of Gajendra Chouhan as the chairperson of FTII and appointments of Anagha Ghaisas, Shailesh Gupta, Narendra Pathak, Pranjal Saikia and Rahul Solapurkar to the FTII governing council and FTII society. The selection of the aforementioned persons was made not on the basis of their creative contributions in the field, but solely on the basis of their loyalty to the RSS–BJP brigade. On the 53rd day of their strike, the students of FTII came from Pune to New Delhi to March to the Parliament in order to have their concerns heard and addressed. JNUSU and AISA, extending solidarity with the students of FTII gave a call urging all the progressive sections to join this march. Besides several other progressive and left organizations, the march was also attended by Kavita Krishnan, PB member CPI(ML), JNUSU president Ashutosh, AISA National President Sucheta De. Com. Kavita while addressing the protestors said that filmmakers were often known to provide different lenses with which one could view the world, however, the current lot which had appointed to crucial posts in FTII, were known more for their preference for only a saffron lens and more often than not breaking any other lens that allowed an alternative perspective. The cultural groups Sangwari and the Hirawal team of Jan Sanskriti Manch also performed during the protest. However, even as the students marched peacefully, the Delhi police once again tried to silence a peaceful march by detaining students and seizing the cameras and mobile phones of those participating in the march. Such acts of brute force to silence voices of dissent are extremely condemnable. CPI(ML) and its fronts will continue to stand in solidarity with the students of FTII as they wage a brave struggle against saffronization of education and dilution of quality of higher education.
