DU professor says “marks jihad” behind Kerala students’ perfect score

An associate professor at a college in Delhi University on Wednesday blamed “marks jihad” for the “inexplicable flow of students from Kerala” getting admission. Recently, Kerala students with 100% marks were in news for grabbing most seats in India’s top University.

Rakesh Kumar Pandey, associate professor in Physics at Kirori Mal College, says “the invasion of Kerala Board students with perfect 100 percent marks can not be considered as unplanned”.

Pandey is a columnist for OpIndia, a right-wing mouthpiece and the former president of the National Democratic Teachers Front.

“I have all reasons to believe that this is a planned move with the support of the power that is presently enjoying in Kerala. Love done with the intention other than love is Love Jihad and marks allocation with an intention guided by reasons other than academic is also Marks Jihad,” states his press release.

Kerala students registered their protest against the “derogatory” statement.

“Every student is entitled to admission so long as they clear the cut-offs in DU,” says Nidha Parveen, a former student of Delhi University from Kerala. “I believe that allegations spurred out of sheer hatred from these professors are nothing but another pile of dump to be firmly addressed”.

“As is evident from his statement, his intention is nothing but an addition to the anti-Muslim bigotry of the state”.

Meanwhile, over 100 admissions of students of the Kerala board were put on hold by the DU over confusion related to their marksheets. But the matter was resolved after officials contacted the state board on Wednesday.

Pandey says that the majority of these students are comfortable neither in Hindi nor in English. He also demanded for “investigation” and claimed it is not “normal”.

“All these students do not have 100 percent marks in there eleventh class,” he added.

Students of Delhi University are calling for action against the professor. “we strongly express our dissent towards the same and demand the immediate suspension of Dr Rakesh kumar pandey,” Nuha Mariam, secretary of Fraternity Movement, Delhi University, told Maktoob.

He stressed DU to implement an entrance examination “to check such manipulations by some elements who have intentions that are not guided by academics”.

Kerala State Education Board had made some leniency in examination in the last exam considering the stress of students due to the pandemic.

3.28,702 students have qualified for higher education out of 4,46,471 students who appeared for the Plus two exams this year. A total of 48383 students have scored A+ grade.

According to the rules, the varsity considers only the marks of the Class 12 exams and cannot deny admission to any student who meets the cut-off criteria.