India Tomorrow
NEW DELHI, DECEMBER 13—A peaceful protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill by Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) university students turned violent on Friday afternoon when they were prevented by the police to march to the Parliament House.
Police burst teargas shells and used lathi-charge to disperse the students. Dozens of students are reported to have been injured and some of them seriously injured are admitted in Holy Family Hospital and other nearby hospitals. Among the protesters included girl students as well.
Even the mediapersons covering the event were also targeted by the police. A number of mediapersons are reported to have sustained injuries from police action.
Over 100 students were detained and taken Badarpur Police Station.
The clash between the police and students took place as the police had barricaded the university campus and announced that it will not allow the students to march out of the campus. Police resorted to lathi-charge when the students removed the barricades and tried to march out of the university.
Aam Aadmi Party MLA Amantullah Khan, who had gone to take stock of the situation after the clashes, told India Tomorrow that students had planned to take out a peaceful march. “But police resorted to lathicharge and blasting teargas shells to prevent students march and this led to clashes between the two sides”, he said.
The MLA said that the use of force was disproportional. According to him, over 200 teargas shells were blasted by police.
A student, seeking anonymity, said, “The students were marching in a very peaceful manner but the police stopped us and resorted to lathi-charge on the students”.
But the police denied the allegations and instead, accused the students of attacking the police first prompting police to retaliate.
Students said that university’s proctor tried to intervene and prevent the police from attacking the students. But the police did not listen.
But videos of the clash circulated on social media showed police indulging into beating students.
To prevent students from marching to Parliament House, the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) had briefly closed the Patel Chowk and Janpath stations. A metro official in a tweet said, “As advised by the Delhi Police, the entry and exit gates of Patel Chowk and Janpath metro stations have been closed. Trains will not halt at these stations”. However, both the stations opened after an hour.
The clashes are also taking place in North-Eastern states of Assam, Tripura, Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya between the CAB protesters and the police.
CAB, which has become a law after President Ram Nath Kovind’s assent to it on Thursday night, allows citizenship rights to non-Muslim migrants from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. As lakhs of Bangladesh migrants are living in the Northeast region, the locals feel that giving citizenship to them to enable them to settle permanently in their states would harm their local identity and culture, besides resulting into change of political equations.
