VIDEO: Attackers beat protesting students, teachers at Indian university
- 06 Jan 2020
Delhi police are investigating how masked men burst into a premier university and attacked a student protest with sticks and rods, an officer said on Monday, the latest incident to ignite criticism of India's ruling Hindu nationalists.
Sunday's attack at a university long seen as a bastion of left-wing politics comes as students nationwide lead a campaign against a citizenship law introduced last month by Prime Minister Narendra Modi that is seen as targeting Muslims.
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Violence swept the Jawaharlal Nehru University on Sunday as several masked individuals, both male and female, thrashed students, including girls, and teachers inside the varsity campus with wooden and metal rods.
Two officer-bearers of the Jawaharal Nehru University Students Union (JNUSU), including President Aishe Ghosh - who was reportedly hit over the eye with an iron rod, received severe injuries. They accused RSS' student wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP) for the rampant violence in the campus.
"I have been brutally beaten up by masked people. I don't know who they were," Ghosh said as she broke into tears while blood flowed profusely from her head. She has been taken to a nearby hospital.
JNUSU General Secretary Satish Chandra was also injured in the attack.
JNUSU Vice President Saket Moon also accused the ABVP of leading the attack, which was bolstered by outsiders.
In a WhatsAap message to the media, Moon said:' "ABVP has formed a mob of goons from outside the JNU campus. They are going room to room with sticks, stones."
Hostel rooms, and lobbies were vandalised during the assault while several vehicles standing on roads were damaged by the unidentified miscreants.
The administration's response on the issue is still awaited, while police had reached the spot also.
The situation turned violent after masked goons attacked a peace march being carried out by teachers and students against the violence in campus.
Bollywood actor Swara Bhasker, who is a graduate of JNU, tweeted a video message in which she is heard asking people to gather in large numbers at the campus gate to stop mob violence.
Earlier, the ABVP had accused Left inclined students of vandalising the Periyar hostel and severely injuring various students present inside the hostel.
"Around four to five hundred members of the left wing gathered around the Periyar hostel, vandalised the hostel and forcibly entered the hostel to thrash the ABVP activists inside," ABVP's JNU unit President Durgesh told reporters.
The ABVP claims its presidential candidate Manish Jangid was injured badly and may have suffered a fractured hand after he was assaulted.
He further alleged that stones were also hurled on students which caused severe head injuries to some of them.
"They hurled stones, used batons to thrash students inside," he added.
