Slogans interrupt Israeli academic’s session in University of Hyderabad

Hyderabad: Israeli academic and University of Haifa professor Ornit Shani was interrupted by a group of students during a session at the University of Hyderabad, where she was discussing her book Assembling India’s Constitution: A New Democratic History.

During the event, students raised slogans calling for resistance to violence and criticising Israel’s policies towards Palestinians. Among the slogans reported were calls to “Break the silence, resist the violence“, “No alliance with the tyrants,” and “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

Students also displayed placards carrying messages such as “Free Palestine”, “Israel is a genocide cancer” and “Hindutva and Zionism, ideological cousins”. A video of the protest was shared by The Observer Post, Siasat Daily reported.

The protest appeared to centre on Shani’s academic association with Israel and what students described as her silence over Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Activists have also argued that Israeli academics can be closely connected to state and military institutions and have questioned their participation in academic events amid the ongoing genocide.

Shani is associated with the Department of Asian Studies at the University of Haifa. She co-authored Assembling India’s Constitution with Rohit De and has also written How India Became Democratic, Communalism, Caste and Hindu Nationalism and The Violence in Gujarat.