Cheena Kapoor
26 February 2020•Update: 26 February 2020
NEW DELHI, India
Some students of more than a group of 100 suffered injuries Wednesday after they were roughed up by police while protesting outside the home of Chief Minister of Delhi Arvind Kejriwa.
Protesters gathered outside the Kejriwa’s house late Tuesday, to urge action against those responsible for violence in the city but police fired water cannons to disperse students and detained more that 35 before releasing them early Wednesday.
The student protesters allege that during their detention, police officers forced them to fight and demanded they chant, “Jai Shree Ram,” or “Hail Lord Ram,” a slogan synonymous with right-wing Hindu nationalists.
“We were asked to beat-up our friends if we did not take the orders, they threatened to beat us up. We were asked to chant Ram slogans, too,” said Mohammad Harris, a Physics Honors student of the Jamia Milia Islamia University.
At a hospital where those injured were taken for treatment, police also threatened doctors not to make a Medico-Legal Case (MLC). The MLC was later prepared but the pick-up location was changed.
“They changed the detainees' pick-up location from outside the CM’s residence to one of the protest sites in the riot-affected areas, to show that these students were picked up from the riot sites,” a lawyer from the Human Rights Law Network, who wanted to remain anonymous, told Anadolu Agency.
Students, while still shocked by the horrors of the night, said they are not deterred them. Despite injuries, they set to fight again.
“We were bundled into a van and were punched and slapped by the police officials. They took off my glasses and hit me hard. My elbow got sprained and my jacket was torn off,” said Mohammad Safiyat Raza, a former student of the Jamia Milia Islamia University.
“This gathering was not even related to the protests. We just wanted to meet the chief minister to point-out the inaction and incompetence of the police. Now we will go back to protesting, there is no other option for us,” added Raza, who was beaten up by police during his detention.
