Poland Examining Matter of its Student, Who Was at Anti-CAA Rally, Being Asked to Leave India

Kolkata: Even as Polish student Kamil Siedczyński of Jadavpur University, who was asked to leave India by the Foreigners' Regional Registration Office (FRRO) in Kolkata, waits for the next hearing at Calcutta High Court on March 18, the Poland government is examining the matter.

In a reply to News18 through email, Sebastian Kęciek, deputy director in the international projects department of the chancellery of Poland Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that the issue had been forwarded to his country’s ministry of foreign affairs.

“It referred to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), which is responsible for that matter. MFA will get back to you in as short a time as possible,” the mail reads.

On March 5, the Calcutta High Court stayed the government’s ‘leave-India’ notice served upon Siedczyński.

Authorities asked the foreign student to leave India after he participated in an anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA rally in Kolkata.

The HC has stopped Siedczyński’s deportation till March 18 or till the date when it delivers its final judgment. The stay order was passed by the court of Justice Sabyasachi Bhattacharya.

The letter (IMC-4144/Civil Authority/20/08, dated February 14, 2020) that Siedczyński received from the FRRO reads: “Whereas, Kamil Siedczyński, holder of passport number EJ6450428, Polish National is present in India on the strength of S-3 (Student) visa bearing No. VJ9796784 which was granted extension till August 31, 2020 to enable him to study a Master Degree Course in Comparative Literature at Jadavpur University, Kolkata, and whereas he is found to have engaged in anti-government activities. You shall depart from India within fifteen days of receipt of this order.”

On February 27, Siedczyński replied to the FRRO, saying he had nothing to do with any anti-India activity.

“Respected Sir, My name is Kamil Siedczyński. I am a citizen of Poland, who has spent the last seven years learning about India, her culture, heritage and languages. Regarding my presence at the Ram Lila Maidan rally (on December 19, 2020), I want to assure you that I came there with no intention of active participation. I came there driven by sheer curiosity, as everyone in my department (both students and teachers) are actively engaged in different kinds of cultural, artistic, social and political activities. Only in the beginning when a group of students from Jadavpur University started singing, I walked close by them for a few minutes. Then when they told me to raise slogans and hold posters I refused and remained detached. Instead I was roaming around on my own being busy taking pictures exactly like a few more foreigners whom I met that day.”

Siedczyński went on to say that he agreed to respond to “four seemingly neutral questions” from a journalist. “The questions were: Where do you come from? Are you a student? Where do you study and what is your name? All of them he asked in English. After that I left without giving him occasion to ask me more questions. On the basis of this handful of information he somehow managed to write an article which contains four big statements in favour of the protest and criticizing the policy of the government. These words have never been uttered by me and I was not even discussing these issues with anyone during the protest,” the student wrote in his letter.

Siedczyński is presently working on translations of one hundred poems by Czesław Miłosz, the Nobel Prize-winning Polish-American writer and diplomat, into Bengali in collaboration with the Jadavpur University Press supported by The Polish Book Institute.

Siedczyński says he began his education in Poland, where he studied Bengali, Sanskrit and Hindi at the University of Warsaw.

After graduation, drawn by the work and ideas of Rabindranath Tagore, he joined Visva-Bharati as a student, where he completed two language courses (Sanskrit and Bengali) between 2016 and 2018.

He joined Jadavpur University in 2018 for a master’s degree in Comparative Literature. Since then Siedczyński became engaged in cultural and artistic activities, like painting and translation.

In 2019, he translated a short story and a few poems from Polish into Bengali, which have been published in the form of a book.