Students revive Bhagat Singh’s call to think, organise, fight. There is something familiar about students on the streets today. Placards in hand, slogans new but anger old.
From Swadeshi to Quit India to anti-Emergency protests, Indian students have rarely confined themselves to classrooms. Now, as D Raja writes, they are upholding Bhagat Singh’s legacy again.
Bhagat Singh was 23 when he was executed. In his last document To Young Political Workers, written weeks before his death, he didn’t call for martyrdom. He called for study circles, political education, and work among workers and peasants. “His martyrdom was an appeal to young Indians to think, organise and fight for a better future,” Raja notes.
That appeal resonates in 2026. Examination irregularities, paper leaks, and unemployment have pushed students beyond campus gates. Communal polarisation and institutional erosion add to the pressure. The current student movement, Raja argues, is no longer against a foreign ruler. It is against forces that “hollow out the democratic and constitutional foundations of the Republic”.
History backs him. The anti-Hindi agitations in Tamil Nadu, the Assam Movement, and student leadership during the Emergency all show campuses as political nurseries. Today’s students use different tools — WhatsApp, Instagram, crowdfunding — but the core remains: dissent, mobilisation, and demands for accountability.
The challenge is to move beyond anger. Raja says the movement must “go beyond campuses, build solidarity with workers and farmers, stand with Dalits, tribals and women facing discrimination”. That was Singh’s project too — linking student energy to broader social questions.
In an era of cynicism, student protests offer a counter. They suggest that young people still believe politics can change things. Whether that translates into lasting reform depends on organisation, not just outrage. As Singh wrote, thinking and organising must precede fighting.
For a generation raised on reels and algorithms, the reference to a 1931 revolutionary may seem distant. But the questions he posed — about justice, inequality, and the purpose of freedom — are still unanswered.