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Indian historian, professor and Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Sugata Bose made a powerful speech in Lok Sabha about the current situations unfolding in the universities of India. In

addition to talking about being a nationalist and the JNU Sedition Row, he enquired about the present stature of Pakistan’s Leftist PPP party. > Has the Pakistan People’s Party now been 

reduced to a benign > regional party, which once had made its mark with a strong support > in Punjab and is now sliding in that province? ON JNU Bose said although he is not a

communist, he would support JNU students union leader Kanhaiya Kumar, a leftist, and other students for the sake of freedom of expression. He accused the government of being “heartless” in

dealing with the students and said the situation in the JNU should have been handled with sensitivity. > We unequivocally condemn those slogans and posters, however, we > strongly 

oppose the attempt being made to portray the entire > university as hub of anti-national activities, and the onslaught of > state forces on academic freedom. The idea of India is not 

so > brittle as to crumble at the echo of few slogans. Terming the government’s crackdown on some JNU students a “witch hunt”, the Trinamool MP said if universities and students are

attacked in this way, “the legacy of the anti-colonial freedom struggle is undermined”. “What must be avoided is criminality of dissent,” he said. Bose also accused the ruling dispensation

of diverting the nation’s attention from the core issues of governance. ON JADHAVPUR UNIVERSITY Observing that similar problems were witnessed at Jadhavpur University, he said, the West

Bengal government did not over-react but tried to defuse the situation. He said people could disagree with students but it would be incorrect to brand them anti-national and slap sedition

charges on them. > They too have the right to make mistakes. Nobody, Bose said, should claim monopoly on nationalism and the government should respect the right of everyone including that

of students to freedom of speech and expression. Quoting Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, he said, it would be wrong to pursue nationalism which is “narrow, selfish and arrogant.” > I 

deplore the brand of nationalism espoused by members of the > treasury benches that I find narrow, selfish and arrogant. SUGGESTIONS He suggested that laws dealing with sedition should be

repealed as they were enacted by colonial rulers to subserve their ends. The passionate speech of Bose was appreciated by several members of the House. Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and

Rahul Gandhi walked up to his seat to congratulate him. _(With inputs from PTI and IANS)_ Published: 25 Feb 2016, 10:22 AM IST