The introduction of the communal element in Aligarh Muslim
University’s admission
policy is an unmitigated tragedy
BY IRFAN HABIB
The recent imposition of a 50 per cent quota for Muslims in
admissions at Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) has obtained a certain amount of
attention in the media and it is important that we begin with a recapitulation
of certain historical facts to set the measure in a proper context. In a speech
in 1883 at Lahore, Aligarh’s founder Sir Syed Ahmad Khan said proudly of the MAO
College, later to become the Aligarh Muslim University: "There is no
discrimination between Hindus and Muslims." Both the founder and his successors
did not at any time see any conflict in the University’s keeping its doors open
to all, while promoting the spread of modern education among Muslims.
The AMU was a fairly small university when Independence came. With the AMU
(Amendment) Act, 1951, the Government of India took up the entire responsibility
for its maintenance, and provided it with a largely democratic and autonomous
structure. The result of these steps was the beginning of a phase of expansion
of the University, with central government funds (afterwards routed through the
University Grants Commission). The Chatterji Committee appointed to review the
working of the University (1960) commended the Act of 1951 and agreed that a
policy of admissions, where some preference may be given to internal students,
should continue. The Act of 1951 forbade in its Article 8 the admission of
students through any "test of religious belief", and the question of reservation
for Muslims was not raised by anyone.
Unfortunately, a sudden enhancement of the internal quota to 75 per cent in
1963 and its proposed reduction in 1965, created a violent incident in the
latter year. The Government of India took the opportunity to practically scuttle
the Act of 1951 through an Ordinance and in effect took over control of the
University’s administration by its nominees. This action had the most disastrous
consequences. As against government control, the issue of AMU’s autonomy as a
minority institution was raised for the first time by many critics of the
government’s ham-handed act. It was only after seven years that in 1972 certain
amendments were made to restore some internal authority to the AMU, but there
yet remained in it far too many undemocratic provisions, reminiscent of the 1965
Ordinance.
The provisions of the Amendment Act of 1972 therefore remained subject to
controversy. Finally, in 1981 Indira Gandhi’s government brought forth
amendments to show that they were trying to underline the minority character of
the AMU. This they claimed to have done by defining the AMU as "the educational
institution of their choice established by the Muslims of India" (Section 2
(l)), and to insert in Section 5 (2), a sub-section (c), enabling the University
"to promote especially the educational and cultural advancement of the Muslims
of India". But that these provisions were intended to have no effect on the
policy of admissions was shown by the reformulation, by the same Amendment
Act, of Section 8 in the following words: "The University shall be open to
all persons (including the teachers and taught) of either sex and of whatever
race, religion, creed or class". The only proviso to this was permission
to provide religious instruction to "those who have consented to receive it".
There is no proviso for any kind of denominational reservation.
Whatever the other elements of the Act of 1981, it should be noted that the
University’s admission policy remained unaffected by its passage, and there was
no resort to any discrimination made on religious grounds in admissions in
accordance with the institution’s own traditions.
The whole question was reopened by the BJP government in 2003-04. In his
effort to bring admissions to all professional courses in the country under his
control, Murli Manohar Joshi, the then Human Resource Development (HRD)
Minister, sanctioned a 50 per cent Muslim quota for the Jamia Hamdard (a "Deemed
University"), and, as the AMU vice chancellor has confirmed, offered the same to
the AMU. It is not surprising that the VC of AMU has been citing the Hamdard
Deemed University’s quota system as a precedent for AMU, although Hamdard is an
institution managed by a private trust, while the AMU is administered according
to a parliamentary Act and, being maintained by the government, is ‘part of the
State’ in the eyes of the law.
It seems from the statements of the present HRD Minister Arjun Singh himself
that soon after the UPA government took office it fell to the same temptation of
drawing political mileage from pursuing the path pioneered by the NDA. The HRD
Minister has claimed that this step was a part of the UPA’s own Common Minimum
Programme. At least in this item, then, it would seem that the UPA’s vision has
remained the same as that of the NDA!
The new admission policy, which reverses a tradition established since AMU’s
foundation, stipulates that at the maximum only 25 per cent of the seats in the
main professional and technical courses (Medicine, Engineering, Management,
etc.) would now be absolutely open to merit. A further 20 per cent will be
reserved for internal students. For ‘Muslims of India’, who fail to enter the
AMU through these two channels, a 50 per cent quota would be provided. Finally,
there will be a five per cent discretionary quota for admitting children of
employees, alumni, government servants, SC/ST candidates, etc. In Medicine, the
percentages are 25 per cent general, 25 per cent internal and 50 per cent for
Muslim candidates not getting through under the first two categories. There is
thus to be practically no SC/ST quota at any level. The University authorities
have indicated that they intend to raise the reservation for such Muslims as are
not able to get admitted through general competition to 66.6 per cent.
All this has been done without any claims that the proportion of Muslims in
various test-based courses is so low as to make Muslim reservation a material
issue. One would have thought that that the proponents of the communal quota
should have first come forward with statistics about the actual Muslim
proportion in the University and in the test-based admissions. Indeed, AMU’s
official spokesmen have been telling the media that the change in Muslim
proportion would not be more than marginal. The same spokesmen have also been
speaking of the "stranglehold" by Muslims of UP and Bihar over AMU, but none has
cared to explain how the communal quota would prevent candidates from these
states getting admitted to AMU.
What the University authorities and the HRD Ministry have entirely failed to
recognise is the blow they have struck at the character and repute of the AMU.
The letter from the MHRD to allied parties quotes from the speech of late CPI
leader Indrajit Gupta where he rightly said that a university does not become
communal if it has a majority of Muslims – which for the AMU has always been the
case. But if a religious test is imposed – which Indrajit Gupta never
contemplated, and which Section 8, as redrafted by the very Amendment Act of
1981, entirely bans – it can no longer be said that the admissions to AMU are
not communally oriented. The substantive reduction of the general quota cannot
but dilute the competitive element in the admission tests and depreciate the
value of the AMU’s degrees in the public eye. Here the AMU is in a more
vulnerable position than any ordinary minority college which is usually
affiliated to a university. Whatever the latter’s admission policies, its
students compete with students of the general colleges, and get the degree of
the affiliating university, which is not itself a minority institution. The AMU
grants its own degrees, so that its degrees’ repute cannot but be directly
affected by its new policy of communal reservation.
Far from addressing this very important issue, the University authorities
have, in order to justify their new admission policy, publicly run down the
quality of education imparted at the AMU both in its schools and in its
University classes (Admission Review Committee’s Report, pp. 2-3). One would
have thought that this is a very damaging rebuke to the University
administration for not having maintained proper teaching standards; it can
hardly be deemed the fault of the candidates admitted under the system
previously in force. And how would Muslims be served if they are enticed to a
University which, we are officially told, has "many problems which have
contributed negatively to its academic standards"? Indeed, given such
irresponsible statements from the authorities about their own institution, and
the absence of any academic vision on their part, it is obvious that they find
it easier to appeal to communal sentiment than to think of the careers of their
students.
A University is an intellectual community. Until now it was the proud boast
of AMU that once a student is admitted here, there would be no discrimination
between him and others on any sectarian grounds. Neither the University
authorities nor the MHRD seem willing to consider the very disturbing fact that
now on the AMU campus there would be two sets of students – one set
disadvantaged by its religion, and having only half the chance than the other of
getting admitted to a higher course. One cannot predict the tensions that such
discrimination could breed on the campus.
There is, finally, the legal tangle to consider. There may be eminent
authorities, including the Ministry of Law, which are ready to opine that the
AMU is a minority institution under Article 30. But even in the unlikely
circumstance that they are right, law cannot force a minority institution to
have a communal reservation – many minority colleges, in fact, do not have such
reservation at all. This apart, it is clear from Article 30 of the Constitution
that its framers had in mind only educational institutions with private
managements when they conceived of minority institutions. The Supreme Court of
India, in TMA Pai Foundation vs. State of Karnataka too, clearly had only
such institutions in mind. The judgement laid down that "the percentage of
non-minority students" in a minority institution has to be notified by the state
government. In other words, if recognised as a minority institution, the AMU
would need to have a "non-minority quota" as well, to be fixed by the state
government! There is also the possibility that the legal status of the AMU may
be adversely affected. As a minority institution, under Article 30, the AMU must
be deemed to be "administered" by the minority; it cannot therefore be "a part
of the State", falling under the writ-jurisdiction of the courts and having
corresponding legal protection. The complexities are enough to make admissions
and other administrative measures subject to unending litigation. The Aligarh
Muslim University, a product of so much labour and such large national
investment, surely deserves a better prospect.
The introduction of the communal element in the AMU’s admission policy thus
seems to be an unmitigated tragedy. That it seems a fait accompli does
not make it any less unfortunate.