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CITIZENSHIP
in a statement issued to media. dents inside the library and thrashed them. Another
According to the students, they were protesting at witness who was present in the library says that the
the gate no 7 of the campus and at the same time, some police thrashed the students badly including him and
locals were protesting on the opposite side. As the their bags and shoes are still lying at the floor of the
protesters marched towards the police barricade, the library. “I was witnessing the whole horror when the
latter began to lathi charged the women protestors. police both from the gate no 7 and 8 entered the cam-
This agitated the crowd. Before the protestors could pus. The number of the policemen was around 400
retaliate they were attacked with teargas and lathi with lathis and weapons.”
charge by the police. Some of the protestors realised Another students shares, “One of my friends, Kaif
that some unidentified men started to vandalise four was detained by the police and he was released lat-
buses and later set the buses on fire. er. Kaif has torture marks on his body which clearly
“I was present there. Students and locals were indicates that he was also beaten up by the police
marching peacefully when the police started lathi inside the police station. The police even arrested the
charge and asked us to move backwards. The police students from Holy Faith Hospital who had received
also resorted to pelting stones in order to chase away injuries during the protest.”
the protesters but, later on, the students picked up the A student of Mass Communication and Research
stones too,” says a third year semester student. Centre who was in the university when the violence
He also alleged that the police pulled the girl stu- broke out says, “The police manhandled the students
mercilessly and also lobbed teargas and firing rounds
when the students were trying to hide themselves
under desks, inside washrooms. The police hit them
with lathis even those who were not the part of
the protest.
KASHMIRI STUDENTS ARE FEARFUL
Tehelka spoke with a group of research scholars from
Kashmir in Jamia who are of apprehensions that what
if they are targeted unnecessarily for being Kashmiri.
“We don’t understand why some nations media chan-
nels are targeting Kashmiris over this protest,” says a
student from Kashmir. “Jamia students are protest-
ing against the CAA and police brutality but why are
we (Kashmiris) being targeted over again and again
whereas, the Kashmiri students have not come out
directly in any protests,” says another Jamia student
from Kashmir.
“We stand in solidarity with Jamia students but to
say that we are behind the protest across the country
is not right. Media channels should avoid using jar-
gons that give wrong impression about us. Our fami-
lies are already worried, “ says Omar*, a PhD student
in Jamia from Kashmiri. The flame of CAA protest,
ignited by the people of north-east region, especially
Assam, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura has
now proliferated to states like West Bengal, Delhi,
Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka rest of the country.
Educational institutes like IIT Bombay, Jadavpur Uni-
versity, Calcutta University, Indian Institute of Engi-
neering Science and Technology, Shibpur, the Centre
for Studies in Social Sciences, Presidency University, to
Harvard College in London and other colleges abroad
have come forward in support of the Jamia protest
and voice against the CAA.
LETTERS@TEHELKA.COM
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