Hyderabad: Not many know that the inception of the Hyderabad Central University (HCU), which later became University of Hyderabad (UOH), has a very strong connection with the Gandhi family.

The sight of the fallen Telangana martyrs, many of who were gunned down in front of Dwaraka lodge near Lakdikapul during the 1969 Telangana movement for separate statehood, had moved the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi so much that she not only rushed to Hyderabad immediately, but kept assuring the people that she was there for them.

She held talks with the leaders from both the regions and came up with the Eight-point Formula. One of those points was how the University of Hyderabad got established through an Act of Parliament (Act No. 39 of 1974). It initially functioned out of India Sarojini Naidu’s residence Golden Threshold in Abids, which she dedicated for the purpose of education.

It was Indira Gandhi who inaugurated the University of Hyderabad campus, and her son the next Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi attended the silver jubilee celebrations of the university. Whether it was Rohith Vemula’s movement, or his occasional visits to the university, even Congress MP Rahul Gandhi kept the family connection going.

UoH was established in 1974 with 5,000 acres of land belonging to the seventh Nizam Mir Osman Ali Khan, during whose time the erstwhile state of Hyderabad was merged into the Indian union in 1948 via military action called Operation Polo.

Professor Gurbaksh Singh, who was the first vice-chancellor, built the university bringing subject matter experts from across the country and globe together with a vision of building the University of Hyderabad as great as Nalanda, Takshashila and Vikramshila universities.

“Gurbaksh Singh battled many attempts to encroach into university land. Even when Marri Chenna Reddy tried to shift the university to Nagarjuna Sagar in 1980, Singh took the issue to Delhi, and Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister, had words of caution for the state government, that it had no right to interfere into UoH’s matters,” recalls Madhusudhan Yadav, a retired campus employee and a staunch Telangana activist, who spent over 30 years of his life, starting from Golden Threshold.

Golden Threshold is also significant, as Mahatma Gandhi used to frequent the place, and had even planted a tree there.

According to Dr Mohd Abbas, faculty of sociology, BR Ambedkar Open University, philosopher Dr Ramchandra Gandhi, the grandson of Mahatma Gandhi had resigned his job in just one day when there was harm done to the tree planted by Mahatma Gandhi at the Golden Threshold.

Madhusudhan Yadav told Siasat.com that 1,500 acres of University of Hyderabad’s lands were given for the construction of GMC Balyogi Stadium when N Chandrababu Naidu was the chief minister of the joint Andhra Pradesh state in the late nineties. Apart from that, another 200 acres were given by former AP chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy to government employees, and hundreds of acres were also allotted for various other infrastructure including the a bus depot.

He claims that presently there are just around 2,000 acres left with the University of Hyderabad. Whether the 400 acres being claimed by the Revenue department comes under those 2,000 acres, is a concerning question.

“Why is the vice chancellor not leading the movement from the front,” Yadav questions, also hoping President Draupadi Murmu, who is the chancellor of the university, would issue a notice to the chief secretary of Telangana.

He feels that BJP MLAs and its youth wings protesting against the Congress government’s move to auction 400 acres of land in Kancha Gachibowli would just be treated just as a knee-jerk reaction.

“Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is the in-charge of the Centre, has to take a decision to protect the central university,” he demanded, and also questioned why deputy chief minister Bhatti Vikramarka and industries minister D Sridhar Babu, who are alumnus of University of Hyderabad, are silent on the matter.