As far as the University Grants Commission is concerned, there are millions of such ‘controversial’ persons in Indian universities — all of them students, if its April 2015 Guidelines on Safety of Students on and off Campuses of Higher Educational Institutions are anything to go by. These directives recommend the use of biometrics for marking student attendance in classes as well as in hostels, pointing out that such measures will have the additional advantage of enabling administrations “to keep an eye on a student’s movement and whereabouts in failsafe manner”(sic). All university buildings are expected to be secured by high boundary walls surmounted by “a fence of spiralling barbed wire”. “Girl students” (really, will government institutions ever stop infantilising women?), their visitors, and their belongings should be physically checked at entrances to academic buildings and hostels by “sufficiently armed guards”.
The UGC’s carceral fantasy continues with the further suggestion that wherever feasible, universities should aim to set up police stations within their premises. This seems to be purely for the convenience of the police, so that they can “handle any crisis situation in an instant” and run nightly patrols as a preventive measure. Further, the university is expected to arrange talks by officials of police and public administration departments at least once a semester on matters of safety and security.
