Lucknow Literary Festival cancelled due to Kanhaiya Kumar’s ‘sensitive presence’

Lucknow: After the district administration withdrew permission to conduct the Lucknow Literary Festival (LLF), the fest was prematurely ended on Saturday. The event came to end before Member of Parliament Asaduddin Owaisi was to address a session.
Activists of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), RSS student wing and Hindu Yuva Vahini, on Friday, created chaos at the Literary Fest against the JNU students’ union president Kanhaiya Kumar.
Organisers of the event failed to update the district administration about Kanhaiya Kumar’s “sensitive” presence, and concerns over his “anti-national talk” as reasons for withdrawing permission, cited officials.
The event was then shifted to a closed hotel room as a number of delegates, including Owaisi, had turned up for participation, reports Times of India.
“I had applied for a permit on October 24 and received it on November 9, a day before the event. The administration was informed about details of the programme. However, since Kumar’s affirmation was yet to be received, his name was not included. There was no option to update the list,” said organiser Shamim Arzoo.
“Presence of Kanhaiya Kumar at the programme is a sensitive issue. The organisers did not inform us about his participation or we would have asked them to hold the event at a later date,” said district magistrate Kaushal Raj Sharma.
Additional district magistrate of the trans-Gomti area, Anil Kumar Singh said, “The discussions at the event were anti-social. There was inadequate information on guest names and an expected crowd and the power connection taken for the event was illegal.”