Rabbits before lawyers, tigers before JNU 30 cops and only 15 students injured: Police

JNU students and teachers came under police canes and boots on a day the students marched 10km towards Parliament demanding a rollback of hiked hostel fees that they say two in five boarders cannot afford. While the students were dispersing in the evening, they were chased and hit by policemen, including plainclothes officers. A teacher, who had just persuaded the students to make way for traffic, was kicked, punched and caned by two policemen who accused him of “teaching students to protest”. A journalist wearing a large badge inscribed with “Press” in block letters was hit and gashed on the head by a CRPF jawan. By the end of the day, at least 50 students had been admitted to various hospitals. “Is lathicharge and breaking heads of JNU Students, and leaving them bloodied the humanity of the Delhi Police? When they were thrashed by lawyers, they remembered the dignity of the uniform? Don’t such incidents stain the uniform?” Delhi’s ruling Aam Aadmi Party’s Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh tweeted.


Last year, the police had run riot at a JNU rally against alleged sexual harassment by a teacher and cuts in admissions. An inspector was then suspended for molesting a woman reporter, and a woman news photographer was beaten and her camera snatched by cops. Monday’s march had been the first protest for Sachin Kumar, 18, son of a single mother who works for a daily wage in Churu, Rajasthan. Kumar, pursuing a BA in the Russian language, is the students’ union’s youngest councillor. “We didn’t expect such a brutal response to a peaceful march. All our parents are watching TV and are calling us to say, ‘Stay behind the march’,” Sachin said. “I studied at a Navodaya Vidyalaya, and subsidised education is my only option. This violence only strengthens our resolve to fight back till we ensure that our affordable hostels remain that way. The government wants to deny this because we are publicly funded and yet dare to question them.”

JNU students have been on strike for the last three weeks after the introduction of a new hostel manual that almost doubles the hostel fees, raising them above the annual stipend of Rs 60,000 a non-NET fellowship brings. Union human resource development minister Ramesh Pokhriyal had been stranded at JNU’s convocation for several hours last week because of protests outside. Although Pokhriyal and the University Grants Commission secretary has met the protesting students, vice-chancellor M. Jagadesh Kumar has confined himself to issuing appeals to the students in print and video to call off the agitation. The varsity had approved the changes at an executive council meeting held outside the campus, offering a rebate to “below poverty line” students — an outdated categorisation that is currently not defined. “My mother earns only Rs 2,300 a month but she would still not qualify under the BPL category, which is defunct anyway,” Sachin said. While the police blocked the student march at JNU’s gates, the HRD ministry constituted a “high power committee” around 11.30am to talk to the students and university authorities and recommend ways to end the agitation. The committee members include former commission chairperson V.S. Chauhan, current commission secretary Rajnish Jain and the All India Council for Technical Education chairperson Anil Sahasrabuddhe.