DU cancels talk in its sociology colloquium series, cites lack of approval

“The university has no problem with the tradition of the colloquium being followed… we just wanted to be informed,” he added.

“In recent times, we have cancelled a few other events, which were being held without taking any prior permission. There is a system in place to hold events and we request members to follow it,” Singh further said.

The colloquium has been running for over the past 60 years, even through the Emergency period, said faculty members.

The talk, titled ‘Land, Property, and Democratic Rights’ by Namita Wahi, Senior Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, was scheduled for Friday at 3 pm in the M N Srinivas Seminar Room at the Delhi School of Economics (DSE).

When contacted, DU Registrar Vikas Gupta said, “We have been reiterating that the university should be informed prior to holding any events. We keep circulating these guidelines again and again. When public space of the university is used, guidelines need to be followed.” He added that the administration has recently cancelled two such events in two departments in June and August.

According to faculty members, the department received instructions from the V-C and the Registrar to cancel the event and report compliance immediately. No formal reason for the cancellation was provided.

The cancellation drew sharp criticism from faculty, including sociologist Nandini Sundar, who announced her resignation as convenor of the colloquium on Wednesday night. “Since I can no longer guarantee the intellectual integrity of the research colloquium and that it will not be cancelled arbitrarily at the last minute, I have resigned,” she wrote on social media.

Calling the decision “a serious diminishing of our academic freedom,” Sundar noted that the Friday colloquium — one of the oldest traditions of the Department of Sociology — has functioned independently “through the Emergency and all the other decades since the department was set up”.

In her statement, Sundar said no reason was given in writing or otherwise for the cancellation and alleged that “the RSS-led government is scared of any discussion around land and democratic rights”.

In a statement, DU AC (Academic Council) member and faculty of Jesus and Mary College, Maya John, said: “The recent interference of the DU authorities in the established colloquium series of the Sociology Department… marks a new low for the academia and quality research in the country…”

“Further, the topic on land and democratic rights is a conventional/traditional topic of sociological discussion. It is also to be noted that the… colloquium is a long-standing and prestigious good practice of the department, and has nurtured vibrant academic discussion and sharing of research. The incident smacks of extreme administrative high-handedness and constitutes yet another endeavour at undercutting the academic autonomy of the university’s research departments… Such action needs to be reversed with immediate effect,” John added.

The weekly colloquium, a part of graduate teaching, has hosted leading scholars and public intellectuals over the years and is regarded as a key space for academic discussion at DSE.