 Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to first congratulate the teachers of JNU for having organized this function here, the soft snow. You are talking about the fact that you could not get space within the campus to organize this meeting. I am not at all surprised. But I'd like to add that you are lucky that you got this. I know of some people who are trying to find space for a function. And they went to various places which were shut in their faces. Because somehow, the powers that be got to know what they were up to. And they have not been provided any space so far. I hope they'll have better luck, like you have had, thanks to Manojha. Nilottabha Babu talked about Garmagaram Bhas, the furious exchanges that we had. But if I want to mention the Garmagaram Chai that we shared after that in the Central Hall of Parliament. No, I'm mentioning it deliberately because that is the essence of our democracy, that you have the fiercest of discussions in the houses of parliament. And the moment you come out, you are friends again. And the Central Hall of Parliament, for those of us who are aware of the geography of that Golghar, we know that the Central Hall of Parliament is the place where parliamentarians meet. And the friendships which might appear to be at a discount in the houses of parliament are resumed with gusto once again. So Garmagaram Bhas and Garmagaram Chai take place both at the same time in parliament. You said, madam, that I have not been a minister for education, HRD. Yeah, I have not. But I have been a minister of some other ministry where I dealt with what was happening in the HRD ministry in not too consequential a manner. But I have been a student of government schools. I have been a student of a college and a university which was funded or run by the government. I have been a teacher getting paid by the government. So I know the role that governments can play even to a fault. But be that as it may. Today, ladies and gentlemen, we are passing through extraordinary times. They are extraordinary because nothing appears to be sacrosanct. Nothing appears to be safe. The marauding crowds are all over the place to destroy whatever comes in their way with one single-minded purpose. And that single-minded purpose is to root out all dissent. Why is JNU being singled out for the kind of bad publicity which we have seen of late? Why? Because everyone knows that situated as you are in the capital of India, there were waves of various kinds of freedom which used to emanate from JNU and spread throughout the country. It was free speech. It was free thinking. It was liberal values. It was dissent. But today, we live in an age where dissent is not tolerated, and therefore you are in trouble. And we have to save the space for dissent because if that space is not available, then our democracy is not only threatened, it becomes non-existent. This higher education, what's it called? Higher Education Commission of India, ECHI. This is part of that same effort. I was going through some of the provisions of the draft which has been circulated. And it's comic. It's comic because it talks about the establishment of the commission. And it says at one place, the chairperson, the vice chairperson, and members shall be scholars being persons of eminence and standing in the field of academics and research, possessing leadership qualities, proven capacity for the institution building, governance of institutions of higher learning, and research and deep understanding on issues of higher education, policy, and practices. So this is the qualification of the people who will man this commission, right? Who is going to select them? The chairperson, there will be a search-come-selection committee headed by the cabinet secretary of the council and consisting of the secretary, higher education, and three other eminent academicians. Three other means these two, of course, are high academicians, the cabinet secretary and the secretary, higher education. And they will, for the fund of it, add three more so that they can select these very distinguished academicians to man the higher education commission. It talks of one doin of industry, not a distinguished industrialist, but a doin. Who is the doin, Sugata Babu? I've heard of a doin of the diplomatic corps, you know. And that doin is going to be the same person who has now got the Institute of Eminence. And then, as has been pointed out, it takes away. It says that it is to ensure autonomy for the higher education institutions. But in the process, and as the act is framed, it takes away all the autonomy. That's completely the contrary. And it has even the power which no authority enjoys today, the power to close universities and institutions of higher learning. So I don't like your face. So I'll close down the institution. I don't like JNU. So I'll close JNU. It will be as simple as that. And UGC will be abolished, this over six decade old institution, which has served and not served, which has its problems. But that will be abolished, like the planning commission was abolished. And it will be replaced by not the higher education commission. It will be replaced by the Ministry of Human Resource Development. And I'm saying this because the funding powers are going to waste with the government. The funding powers are going to waste with the government. And can you imagine what it entails? That every higher education institution in this country, not merely the university, but colleges also, will have to approach the Ministry of Human Resource Development for any financial assistance. There is no intermediary. And I'm saying this, especially to the current members of parliament, that with the abolition of the planning commission, you have removed some kind of a neutral body which used to intercede with the government of India on behalf of the state governments, as far as funding was concerned. And I know it because as finance minister, what the finance minister did was merely to determine the size of the gross budgetary support for the annual plan. And we agreed on a lump sum. And that lump sum was then placed at the disposal of the planning commission. And it was the planning commission which used to allocate funds to the line ministries, as well as to the state governments. So there was somebody between the Finance Ministry and the ministries and the state government, which could take a more or less impartial view. Similarly, here, the role in whichever way it was performed by the university grants commission is now going to be taken over completely by the ministry. And what does the ministry mean? The ministry means a section officer. It means an undersecretary. It means a deputy secretary. And you will have vice chancellors distinguished by chancellors of this country sitting outside the rooms of the undersecretaries and the deputy secretaries in the Ministry of HRD to get an audience in order to be able to get a grant. That is the status to which these learned people are going to be reduced. It is completely against the federal principles of this country. It is not merely an assault on higher education. It is an assault on federalism because all the powers that the state governments through the government have enjoyed will now become a thing of the past and will rest with the government of India. What does it show? It shows that we are dealing with a person and a system which believes in complete control. And this is not the only instance. There are various other areas where such things have been done without much protest. And that is why I welcome this meeting that you organized so that I don't know whether any message is going to go loud and clear from this meeting. I'm not so sure. I'm not so sure. There is an agency, news agency, which is not very far from here. But will they take it up? Will they say that there was a meeting and all of us attended and this is what we said? Perhaps not. Because that is also where some control is being exercised. And it is being determined somewhere else what they should publish, what they should not publish, what they should discuss, and what they should not discuss. And that is why I'm saying that the struggle that you have in your hands is not an easiest struggle. It will have to be fought in parliament. It will have to be fought in the streets. And if somebody can reach a crore of people within minutes, we'll have to reach out to maybe 10 people within a minute. That capacity, we must be able to develop. And that kind of force, we must be able to develop so that we are able to reach out as well as they can through the means that they have at their disposal. This tendency to overpower everything, this tendency to ensure that all descent is crushed, that is the basic tendency which is responsible for bringing this legislation. There is only a draft legislation. Nelotpal Basu was talking about the bill being referred to the Standing Committee. This is the monsoon session of parliament which is taking place. After this, there will be a winter session. The government is squeamish as far as number of days of sessions are concerned. So this session, for instance, has only 18 working days. The winter session may also be equally limited in terms of time, days, working days. That works in our favor. Because if this bill is not allowed to be introduced in this session, and you know how, whether it looks about or not just about, you know what are the points to be raised in order to block a bill from being introduced. My first request to my colleagues in parliament will be that you must block the introduction of the bill. But even if it is introduced, it's not likely to be introduced in this session. But even if it is introduced in the winter session, make sure that it goes through the Standing Committee. That's a demand which must be raised on the floor of whichever house the bill is introduced. And come April May next year, if not even before, we'll all be in the election mode. Therefore, the danger of this bill going through does not appear to be very real at this point of time. It perhaps is not. And we have examples, recent examples, of how popular opposition has persuaded the government to withdraw bills or not to go ahead with certain bills. That is the pressure from outside that we'll have to continue to create or put on the government. And this is such a bad draft. You know this, if you go through it, I have gone through various provisions, but I'm not going to take your time on this. It's a very, very poorly drafted bill with evil intentions. And if we are just able to convey this message to the people of this country that instead of solving the problem, it will only add to the problems that higher education in this country already suffers from. Therefore, the cure will be worse than the disease. I'm sure the people of India will understand. And this bill will be nipped in the butt, like doubling of farmers income by 2022. This bill might also come in a revised form by 2022. Thank you.