A group of IIT Kanpur students' act of naming their pre-Diwali celebration as "Jashn-e-Roshni" led to controversy this week over the use of the Urdu words, with a Union minister alleging "Islamisation" of a Hindu festival.
One of the student organisers said they had, at the request of a teacher, eventually switched off the lighting arrangement that spelt out the name, which means "Celebration of Light".
Confirming the controversy to local reporters, institute director Manindra Agrawal said: "The institute did not organise the event; it was held by the students and they decided the name."
The event, a cultural programme by students of international relations at the IIT, was held on Tuesday.
Speaking off the record, a student organiser said: "Jashn-e-Roshni is a beautiful name, and the Urdu language is very much Indian. Those who don’t understand the intricacies and beauty of Indian languages and culture dubbed it a 'Mughaliya slogan'."
He added: "We didn’t agree. There are many foreign students here who want to know what Diwali is all about, and our idea was to explain this to them in the most artistic manner possible."
The student said the organisers had sent out some invitation cards to teachers and senior students with the name "Jashn-e-Roshni" printed on them.
"Later, we heard that enough noise was made on social media. A teacher came to us (during the event)…. He asked us to change the name and so we switched off the digital glow that showed the name."
Union textile minister Giriraj Singh had on Monday tweeted IIT Kanpur’s Jashn-e-Roshni cards and the similar Jashn-e-Abha cards of Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi, and written: "Don't engage in Islamisation of the festival of Sanatan."
The IIT student said: "We don’t want to reply to some ill-informed people who are involved in spreading disinformation. It is not our job, but there is no question of agreeing with them in principle."
The tech school in Kanpur has been a battleground between progressive students and Hindutva forces, represented most visibly by the RSS shakhas (assemblies) organised on the campus for years by some teachers.
In December 2019, its students held a march on the campus in protest against the police action on Jamia Millia Islamia students in Delhi in connection with a protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
The marching students at IIT Kanpur chanted "Hum dekhenge", a popular song of protest by Pakistani Urdu poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz.
At the time, local Hindutva outfits like the VHP and the Bajrang Dal had picked out some of the lines from the song to claim it was written to promote Islam. The IIT management ordered an inquiry and reprimanded the students for chanting the song.
In 2008, two youths associated with Hindutva groups died when a bomb they were allegedly making in a house behind the IIT campus exploded. Both young men are said to have been regulars at an RSS shakha on the campus.
