Housekeeping Workers Strike: Open letter from Faculty to Vice Chancellor Raychaudhury

Dear Vice Chancellor Somak Raychaudhury,

We, the undersigned members of the faculty, are asking you to intervene in the current situation regarding Ashoka’s housekeeping workers who are on strike. After speaking with them at the peaceful protest site today, we learned of their concerns and demands. These demands are reasonable, and we would like to express our solidarity with them. 

We learnt that they have received no significant or clear increment in as long as 11 years. Their increase is in the range of Rs 100-300 a year, which does not keep pace with inflation. Their demand for a wage increment up till Rs 18,000 and a 10% annual hike is necessary to ensure fair labor practices. 

The workers’ demands also include indemnity for the strike and the rehiring of those workers who have been unjustly terminated. We also support these reasonable demands. 

We believe that these demands can be resolved internally by Ashoka’s administration in dialogue with striking workers. We urge you to intervene in this matter and settle this issue with Bluspring at the earliest. The sooner this is done, the sooner campus life can return to normalcy. 

We look forward to your intervention in resolving this matter.

Signed by, 

Amit Julka, Assistant Professor, International Relations

Aalok Thakkar, Assistant Professor, Computer Science

Tatyana Kostochka, Assistant Professor, Philosophy

Krittika Bhattacharjee, Assistant Professor, Writing

Chitralekha, Associate Professor, Media Studies 

Madhavi Menon, Professor, English

Bittu K R, Associate Professor, Biology and Psychology 

Alexandra Verini, Associate Professor, English

Somendra Mohan Bhattacharjee, Professor, Physics

Mandakini Dubey, Assistant Professor, English

Gaurav C Garg, Assistant Professor, History

Rakhi Peswani, Associate Professor, Visual Arts 

Ravindran Sriramachandran, Associate Professor, Sociology and Anthropology 

Arpita Das, Associate Professor of Practice, Writing

Vivek V. Narayan, Assistant Professor, English 

Sayantani Mukherjee, Assistant Professor, History

Jonathan Gil Harris, Professor, English 

Dipanjan Ray, Assistant Professor, Psychology 

Eloise Wright, Assistant Professor, History

Maya Mirchandani, Associate Professor of Practice, Media Studies 

Huzaifa Omair Siddiqi, Assistant professor, English

Malvika Maheshwari, Associate Professor, Political Science 

Danny Weltman, Associate Professor, Philosophy

Eesha Kumar, Assistant Professor, English

Aditi Chaturvedi, Assistant Professor, Philosophy

Mitul Baruah, Associate Professor, Sociology & Anthropology and Environmental Studies

Aparna Chaudhuri, Assistant Professor, English

Katy Hardy, Assistant Professor, Sociology and Anthropology

Bastian Steuwer, Assistant Professor, Political Science

Can Evren, Assistant Professor, Sociology and Anthropology

Sanjukta Datta, Assistant Professor, History

Alexander Phillips, Assistant Professor, English

Amit Chaudhuri, Professor of Creative Writing 

Naresh Keerthi, Assistant Professor, Sanskrit Studies

Kranti Saran, Associate Professor, Philosophy 

Sumana Roy, Associate Professor of Creative Writing 

Pramoda Kumar, Assistant Professor of Physics

Swargajyoti Gohain, Associate Professor, Sociology and Anthropology 

Mekhala Krishnamurthy, Associate Professor, Sociology and Anthropology Natallia Khaniejo, Visiting Faculty, International Relations 

Suratna Das, Assistant Professor, Physics

Susmita Saha, Assistant professor, Physics Krishna Melnattur, Assistant Professor, Biology and Psychology

Ratul Lahkar, Professor, Economics.

Janice Pariat, Assistant Professor, Creative Writing

Aparajita Dasgupta, Associate Professor, Economics

Kaustav Chakrabarti, Assistant Professor, Political Science 

Ananya Sharma, Assistant Professor, International Relations

Sanyyam Khurana, Assistant Professor, Economics

Kumarjit Saha, Associate Professor, Mathematics

Aakshi Magazine, Visiting Faculty, Media Studies

S. K. Ritadhi, Assistant Professor, Economics

Suraj Krishna M S, Assistant Professor, Mathematics

Nishita Trisal, Assistant Professor, Sociology and Anthropology

Deepak Mehta, Professor of Sociology and Anthropology Kathleen Harbin, Assistant Professor of Philosophy

Amita Baviskar, Professor, Environmental Studies & Sociology-Anthropology

Poulomi Chakrabarti, Assistant Professor, Political Science

Parush Arora, Assistant Professor, Economics

Sramana Majumdar, Assistant Professor, Psychology

Piyali Banerjee, Assistant Professor, Economics

Sarah Zweig, Visiting Faculty, English

Duncan Cordry, Visiting Faculty, Philosophy

Manvi Sharma, Assistant Professor, Environmental Studies

Nadeem Akhtar, Visiting Faculty Persian

Anirban Sen, Assistant Professor, Computer Science

Deepak Mehta, Professor, Sociology and Anthropology

Justy Joseph, Visiting Faculty, English

Rama Akondy, Associate Professor, Biology

Latika Gupta, Visiting Faculty, Visual Arts

Abhishek Khetan, Visiting Faculty, Mathematics

Anup Padmanabhan, Assistant Professor, Biology

Sourav Ghosh, Assistant Professor, Mathematics

Sayan Chaudhuri, Senior Writing Faculty, YIF

Neel Chaudhuri, Visiting Faculty, Performing Arts

Garima Mishra, Assistant Professor, Physics

Natasha Badhwar, Visiting Faculty, Media Studies

Sraman Mukherjee, Assistant Professor, Visual Arts

Kriti Pant, Visiting Faculty, Performing Arts

Abhilasha Sawlani, Writing Faculty, YIF

Devapriya Roy, Assistant Professor, Writing

Surajkumar Thube, Visiting Faculty, Political Science

Ayush Pant, Assistant Professor, Economics

This piece will be periodically updated with additional signatories.

[Edited by Tanush Guha & Nikita Bose]