Students’ organisation says it is mandatory to place Dr. B. R. Ambedkar’s photo at a Constitutional event.
The Constitution Day event organised by Bangalore University was halted after protestors stormed the stage demanding an image of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar to be placed at the event. Students from post graduation and research scholars’ association started shouting how the authorities were ignorant about the issue. They took to the stage and the coordinators of the event had to leave it, causing a huge crowd to gather outside the hall.
Event managers tried to calm the students but they did not relent until an image of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar was placed in the event hall. The students also demanded an apology from the organizers about not placing the image. Lokesh Ram, president of Bangalore University Students Union said, “The image of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar on an event about Constitution Day is mandated by the state government.”
He said, “We interrupted the event because as the circular says, there should be an image of Dr. Ambedkar and we just asked them to place it. So we asked them to apologize and they did after the authorities corrected their mistake.”
A second-year LLM student who was a volunteer at the event said, “We thought the Constitution itself is supreme, which is why we did not use any pictures at all because it stands by itself. Our intention was not to offend anyone, but this just happened anyway.”
Dr. Sathish Gowda N, Nodal Officer and coordinator of the event said, “It happened because we did not place Dr. B. R. Ambedkar’s image at the event, but now we have and the issue is resolved. They were just upset and now that we have placed the image, the event is back to normal.”
N. Mahesh Babu, registrar of Bangalore University said, “The issue is now resolved. Some persuaded people do things like this and it happens a lot, there is nothing new here. There was no need for this to happen.”
