Demonstrators gather behind a police barricade during a protest against a new citizenship law and to show soli... Read More

NEW DELHI: Nearly 400 students from 19 universities across the United States, including Harvard, Yale, Stanford and Columbia, have signed a statement “condemning recent police brutality in Indian universities”. At Oxford in the United Kingdom, students carried out anti-CAA demonstrations.

The signatories have also expressed solidarity with “students across universities in India who are peacefully protesting against the recent passing of the unconstitutional and discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Act.”

“We, students, alumni and the wider community, at universities across the United States of America, condemn the brutal police violence unleashed against students at Jamia Millia Islamia University and at Aligarh Muslim University on December 15, 2019, as a gross violation of human rights under the Constitution of India and International Human Rights Law,” the statement put out online reads.

Other reputed universities whose students signed the statement include MIT, Cornell, University of California, Berkeley and University of Illinois. The students also “condemn” the use of violence against protestors in Assam where five people were killed, including two minor boys who were shot by the police.

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The statement lists down five demands, including “cessation of violence by the police and their complete withdrawal from the university premises”, “immediate, independent, and robust investigation” against police excess. It also calls upon union home minister Amit Shah to “immediately take these necessary steps to curb police brutality or resign.”

While describing police action, the statement says these incidents of violence indicate “complete negation of every norm that guide the functioning of the police in a democratic society governed by the rule of law.”

