From Campuses to Streets: The Political Trajectory of India's Student Movements

Student Politics Beyond Education: Lessons from India’s Student Movement

The student movement in India is encouraging at a time when the country has experienced a significant democratic decline (Figure 1).

From campuses to streets: The political trajectory of India's student movements

Long beforehand Indian political parties had youth wings, its universities were producing leaders. From the struggle of freedom to contemporary debates over caste, free speech and citizenship student politics has operated as a training ground as well as a barometer of India’s ideological battles. To understand this trajectory, it is needed to trace how movements born in hostel common rooms and lecture halls somehow spill into national streets an…