Stand by my remarks, says scholar after row over his Israel-Palestine lecture at Jindal university

Political scientist Achin Vanaik has said that he stands by the remarks he made during a lecture on the history of the Israel-Palestine conflict after the OP Jindal Global University in Haryana asked him to express regrets, reported The Hindu on Monday.

During the lecture at the private liberal arts university on November 1, Vanaik had drawn parallels between Zionism and Hindutva nationalism and questioned why one act of violence is labelled terrorism and others are not, according to leaked videos of the talk.

The former professor of political science at Delhi University also said that Zionism and Hindutva were different as the former was “not anti-Muslim” while the latter was “fundamentally and foundationally anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic”.

Vanaik told The Hindu that his words were taken out of context. “The idea that I am pro-terrorism is absolute nonsense,” he added. “I would want to clarify here that I do consider Hamas’s action as a terrorist action and criticise it.”

Vanaik’s clarification came after Dabiru Sridhar Patnaik, the registrar of the private liberal arts university, wrote a letter to the political scientist on November 13, stating that the statements made by him during his lecture were gratuitous and unrelated to the subject.

The letter described Vanaik’s characterisation of Zionism as “informative” but said the scholar’s comments on Hindutva...

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