NEW DELHI, India
\nA top Indian university has warned its students\u2019 union of strict disciplinary action if it goes ahead with a planned screening of a BBC documentary on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying it might \u201cdisturb peace and harmony\u201d on the campus.
\nModi\u2019s government has dismissed the documentary, which questioned his leadership during deadly riots in his home state of Gujarat in 2002, as \u201cpropaganda\u201d, blocked its airing and also barred sharing of any clips via social media in the country.
\nModi was chief minister of Gujarat during the violence in which more than 2,000 people were killed, most of them Muslims, according to rights groups. He ran the western state from 2001 until his election as prime minister in 2014 and briefly faced a travel ban by the United States over the riots.
\nThe students\u2019 union of New Delhi\u2019s Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), long seen as a bastion of left-wing politics, said on Twitter it would screen the documentary, India: The Modi Question, at its office at 9pm (15:30 GMT) on Tuesday.
\nThe university administration said on its website it had not given permission for the documentary to be shown.
\n\u201cThis is to emphasise that such an unauthorised activity may disturb peace and harmony of the university campus,\u201d the university said.
\n\u201cThe concerned students\/individuals are firmly advised to cancel the proposed programme immediately failing which a strict disciplinary action may be initiated as per the university rules.\u201d
\nPresident of the JNU students\u2019 union, Aishe Ghosh, invited students on Twitter to the screening of the documentary that has been \u201c\u2018banned\u2019 by an \u2018elected government\u2019 of the largest \u2018democracy\u2019\u201d.
\nThe violence in Gujarat erupted in late February 2002 after a train carrying many Hindu pilgrims caught fire, killing 59.
\nCrowds later rampaged through Muslim neighbourhoods across the state, killing and raping dozens of women, in one of the worst religious massacres in India\u2019s history.
\nThe two-part BBC documentary cited a previously classified British foreign ministry report quoting unnamed sources saying that Modi met senior police officers and \u201cordered them not to intervene\u201d in the attacks on Muslims that followed.
\nIt also said the violence was \u201cpolitically motivated\u201d and the aim \u201cwas to purge Muslims from Hindu areas\u201d.
\nThe riots were impossible \u201cwithout the climate of impunity created by the state government\u2026 Narendra Modi is directly responsible,\u201d it concluded.
\nModi has repeatedly denied accusations that he did not do enough to stop the riots and was exonerated in 2012 following an inquiry overseen by the Supreme Court. Another petition questioning his exoneration was dismissed last year.
\nThe BBC said last week that the documentary was \u201crigorously researched\u201d and involved a \u201cwide range\u201d of voices and opinions, including responses from people in Modi\u2019s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
\nThe documentary is also scheduled to be screened on Tuesday at various campuses in the southern state of Kerala, currently governed by a communist party opposed to the BJP.
\nModi\u2019s government has been accused of stifling dissent by free-speech activists and opposition leaders for years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NEW DELHI, India A top Indian university has warned its students\u2019 union of strict disciplinary action if it goes ahead with a planned screening of a BBC documentary on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying it might \u201cdisturb peace and harmony\u201d on the campus. Modi\u2019s government has dismissed the documentary, which questioned his leadership during deadly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":309505,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-309495","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n