A Harvard student, Shruti Kumar, has criticised the university for stopping 13 graduates from attending graduation due to involvement in the Gaza protest.

In her commencement ceremony speech on the university campus, she said that the students belonged to undergraduates from the class of 2024.

She titled her speech ‘The Power of Not Knowing’. In an X clip, Kumar was “sad” about other undergraduates who did not graduate.

“I am deeply disappointed by the intolerance for freedom of speech and the right to civil disobedience on campus,” she said as she shared that 13 colleagues from her batch will not graduate.

“Harvard! Do you hear us? This semester freedom of speech, expression and solidarity became punishment,” Kumar said as she received a standing ovation and applause.

She added that it was about civil rights upholding democratic principles.

“The students had spoken. The faculty had spoken. Harvard, do you hear us?” she said.

In 2023, she said that the Israel-Hamas war awaited them. The whole campus was divided about their stance and this again was a moment of “uncertainty and unrest across campus” and of “not knowing.”

She emphasised that there was “pain, anxiety and unrest across campus” due the Gaza situation.

Kumar is the eldest daughter of South Asian immigrants. She is the first in her family to attend a college in the US.

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