AMU ROW: INTERNET SUSPENDED, PROBE ORDERED
Magisterial probe ordered into Wednesday’s violence
Internet services were suspended in Aligarh and a magisterial probe ordered on Friday into Wednesday’s violence in the wake of the unrest in AMU after the Jinnah portrait row. “There will be no Internet services from 2 pm on Friday to Saturday midnight,” district magistrate Chandra Bhushan Singh said. He also informed that a magisterial probe has been ordered into Wednesday’s incident. The probe will be conducted by additional district magistrate who will submit a report within 15 days.
ALIGARH:
ALIGARH: Internet services were suspended in Aligarh district and a magisterial probe ordered on Friday into Wednesday’s violence in the wake of the unrest in AMU.
“There will be no Internet services from 2 pm on Friday to Saturday midnight,” district magistrate Chandra Bhushan Singh said. He also informed that a magisterial probe has been ordered into Wednesday’s incident. The probe will be conducted by additional district magistrate who will submit a report within 15 days.
The inquiry will look into the circumstances as to how the right wing activists managed to reach the gates of the AMU the second time and why no action was taken by the police to stop them. It will also look into Wednesday’s violence when the students were cane charged by the police.
“The internet services will remain blocked till the midnight of Saturday. This has been ordered under powers vested under section 144 of criminal procedure code and any violation would be punishable under section 188 of Indian Penal Code,” said Singh. This has been done to prevent rumour mongering, he added.
It had come to the administration’s notice that some anti-social elements could vitiate communal harmony by spreading rumours through videos, using Internet services, his order said.
Tension prevailed in Aligarh and students continued with their sit-in at the university’s Baab-e-Syed gate, where they had clashed with the police on Wednesday. They are boycotting classes for the next two days.
The students offered Friday prayers at the scene of the dharna in which a large number of teachers and other members of the AMU fraternity participated.
Wednesday’s clash took place when the students were demanding action against right-wing protesters who entered the campus and wanted the Pakistan founder’s portrait removed from the student union office, where it has been hanging for decades.
The row started after local BJP MP Satish Gautam wrote to AMU raising objections to the portrait.
AMU vice-chancellor Tariq Mansoor on Friday visited the Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College Hospital where three of the students injured in the police lathi-charge are being treated.
The V-C later visited the protesting students and assured them of his “solidarity”.
AMU Teachers’ Association (AMUTA) has sent a memorandum to President Ram Nath Kovind asking him to “urgently institute” a high-level judicial probe into the incident.
They said members of certain outfits entered the campus and disrupted the peaceful academic environment there. AMUTA secretary Najmul Islam said they have urged the President to treat the matter seriously as it involved a breach in the security of former Vice-President Hamid Ansari.