Such an action is naturally criticized by the opponents of the Modi government.
Editorial: An Action that Stunts Intellectualism: On the one hand, the central government is drawing up a program to attract professors and scholars from foreign universities to work in Indian educational institutions; on the other hand, reckless actions like turning back scholars studying India, Indian literature, Indian culture, and Indian languages from Indian airports are also continuing recklessly. On the night of October 20, Professor Francesca Orsini was forcibly returned to Hong Kong from the New Delhi airport.
She had reached India from Hong Kong that same evening. She was not given any reason for such expulsion. It was only told that her name is in the 'black list' due to allegations of violation of visa conditions during previous visits to India and on this basis her entry into Indian soil is illegal. The Home Ministry says that the action taken against Prof. Orsini was taken under international rules. According to these rules, if a foreign guest violates the visa conditions of the host country, he should be ‘blacklisted’ and not allowed to enter the territory of that country.
In the case of Prof. Orsini, the ministry explains that “the rules are common to all, whether one is of Indian origin or foreign origin.” However, the ministry did not consider it appropriate to state in what way Francesca Orsini violated the visa conditions during her previous visits to India. Such a lack of transparency in government orders is not only unfortunate but also a direct violation of the academic rights of scholars and researchers.
In the academic world, Prof. Orsini has the status of a ‘Hindustrian’. This Italian-born scholar is a professor of Hindi and modern North Indian literature at the University of London in Britain and is also the head of the Centre for Cultural Studies there. She has been living in Britain for the past three decades. She has also studied at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and has also been at some other Indian universities.
Her knowledge of India is very extensive. Apart from subjects related to Hindi and Indian literature, she has written about a dozen books on the impact of foreign invaders' attacks on North India on Indian languages. She has also studied Urdu in depth. She should have been honored at the national level for her work on the Hindi language and Indian literature, but the opposite happened. Although the staff at the New Delhi airport treated her with a soft tone, it was still a petty act to send her back to Hong Kong without giving her any notice.
Such an action is naturally criticized by the opponents of the Modi government. The tone of the academic circles is also sharp and so are the left-wing leaders. Prof. Orsini and her husband Prof. Peter Kornicki, who is a scholar of Japanese language and Japanese studies, have refrained from harsh statements on their own. On the other hand, the Congress party has said that the Modi government is “incapable of respecting independent thought and impartial scholarship. It wants to see only its own backstabbing and backwardness in academic circles, not independent thinkers.”
It is being believed that some of Prof. Orsini’s speeches or articles have been critical of the Modi government and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). He is now having to pay the price for these. Academic experts are also opposing the Modi government’s position that Prof. Orsini had been coming to India on a tourist visa, but she kept using this visa for research and study work, which was an unscrupulous act. These experts say that every researcher goes wherever he goes, for research and study, not for entertainment or to take selfies.
Therefore, it is not befitting for governments, especially democratic governments, to implement visa conditions in a narrow-minded and narrow-minded manner. In this context, Prof. Ram Chandra Guha's comment that only "cowardly, mentally ill and extremely stupid governments" can insult an academic in this way does not seem unreasonable. Overall, what has happened is regrettable in the right sense. It has reduced the stature of the Modi government and also of Indian intellectuals.
