Students forced to take down posters of 'Ram Ke Naam' documentary at Ashoka University in light of Ram Mandir's opening

The students of Ashoka University recently staged a protest against the management after they were forced to take down posters of ‘Ram Ke Naam’ documentary’s screening that was supposed to be held in the premises. The protest was virtually joined by Anand Patwardhan, the director of the documentary. A letter was written to Vice Chancellor Somak Raychaudhury and the faculty members that read- “A member of the collective was called alone to meet an administrative official… they were ambushed by multiple administrative officials… eventually, the collective was forced to take down the posters.” The letter added, “While the admin members quoted policy violation to be the reason behind their attempt to stop the screening, a full-fledged aarti and bhajan (worship) was held… for the purpose of celebrating the inauguration…This is directly in violation of the Residence Life Policy that states, ‘festival events must not entail any religious content or rituals.” A student, speaking to The Indian Express, revealed, “A member of the collective was tracked down while he was going to get the printouts of the screening event posters from shops and told that we cannot put them up across the campus. On the other hand, students held religious celebrations in public spaces.” Somak Raychaudhury speaks up The religious celebrations of the Ram Mandir and our screening of the critical historical film with academic content– were not equivalent in nature so as to warrant equivalent treatment; secondly, the film screening was, in fact, subject to restrictions that the celebrations were not.