While controversy continues over the appointment of actor Gajendra Chauhan as the chairman of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) with students even hitting to streets in protest, he has denied to quit the top post.
Chauhan has told NDTV that he won’t quit as the FTII chairman.
Meanwhile, FTII s tudents took out a protest march through the city streets on Thursday, July 2, demanding cancellation of the appointment of Chauhan by the BJP-led government as chairman of the FTII governing council.
With reference to Chauhan’s role as Yudhishthira in TV serial Mahabharata, the students raised slogans like ‘Yudhishthira do not teach us dharma’ and said that FTII’s institutional autonomy should be preserved without political interference in its affairs.
Displaying placards highlighting their slogans and demands, about 150 students walked from the FTII gate to the Balgandharva Theatre square where the march converted into a meeting addressed by local Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Ajit Abhyankar as well as former Bombay High Court Judge BG Kolse Patil among others who supported the students and protesters.
The FTII Students’ Association (FSA) has alleged that Chauhan lacked “credentials, stature and vision” to head the institute which is supposed to give a new direction to Indian cinema and also demanded dissolution as well as reconstitution of the newly appointed FTII Society.
The TV actor’s affiliation with the ruling BJP too has been the focus of the three-week long agitation by students by boycotting classes and stopping academic work.
On an invitation by the Information and Broadcasting ministry, a ten-member delegation of the FSA is scheduled to hold talks with the authorities in Delhi on Friday (July 3) to discuss contentious issues that have led the FTII strike.
Feature image source: India Today