Heads roll, PM Modi takes stock of situation as NSUI, ABVP protest
VARANASI/NEW DELHI: Over 30 hours after the arson and violence in Banaras Hindu University (BHU), the Uttar Pradesh government on Monday transferred three additional city magistrates and two policemen over the incident.
Several students, including girls, and policemen were injured in the cane-charge and stone-pelting around Saturday/ Sunday midnight during a protest against alleged molestation of a hosteller.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah spoke to chief minister Yogi Adityanath over the police action against students, union minister Nitin Gadkari said in Delhi on Monday, adding that an inquiry was being conducted into the incident.
Protesting against the police action against the students, the National Students Union of India (NSUI) and the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) staged demonstrations in Delhi on Monday.
The Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh-affiliated ABVP demanded constitution of a factfinding committee, while the Congress-backed NSUI sought an inquiry under a sitting high court judge and resignation of the BHU vice-chancellor.
The alleged police high-handedness was widely condemned, with Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav hitting out at the Yogi government over the incident.
Rahul Gandhi on Monday demanded an apology from the Prime Minister for the police action against students “as the incident took place in his constituency, Varanasi.”
In Patna, rebel JD (U) leader Sharad Yadav blamed the BJP governments at the Centre and in UP for the “barbaric” lathicharge on the students.
Meanwhile, police said an FIR had been registered against over 1,000 students in connection with the violence and also against policemen involved in the baton-charge on protestors. “Separate FIRs have been registered at the Lanka police station in connection with the violence,” they said.
In the state government action against officials, station officer of Lanka police station, Rajiv Singh, was sent to police lines while deputy superintendent of police Nimesh Katiyar, the Bhelupur circle officer, was moved to the accounts section, police sources said.
Sanjiv Mishra will take over from Singh while Ayodhya Prasad comes in for Katiyar, the sources said.
A release from Varanasi district information office said three additional city magistrates, Manoj Kumar Singh, Sushil Kumar Gaund and Jagdamma Prasad Singh, too, have been transferred.
The violence broke out after police forcibly removed protesting students from outside the vicechancellor’s residence and a campus gate. They were protesting against the failure of the authorities to act against motorcycle-borne men who allegedly molested a university student.
The students alleged that the campus security personnel and police hit them with lathis, pulled many of them by their hair and dragged them.
The fracas forced BHU to advance its Dussehra break by three days from September 28 to September 25.
To prevent the unrest from spreading, the district administration has decided to close Dr Sampurnanad Sanskrit University, Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapeeth and their affiliated colleges till further orders.
A press communiqué said district magistrate Yogeshwar Ram Mishra had issued instruction for the closure of universities and colleges from Monday.
The decision has been taken in view of intelligence reports that the students of other universities and colleges may take to streets in protest against lathi-charge on BHU students.