Known as the pilgrimage of budding politicians, the international university at the heart of capital — Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) — is in news again. This time the students’ wing of ruling BJP government ABVP had staged a protest against the students who had commemorated the judicial hanging of Afzal Guru by screening a movie on Tuesday night and termed it as anti national.
The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) members not only met Vice Chancellor and requested him to rusticate the students, but also called for a press conference on Wednesday and termed the students — who screened the ‘Pro-Afzal’ movie last night — as anti national. The right wing members also demanded Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) to take stringent action against those ‘who want to destroy the peace and harmony of the country’.
“This was an anti-national event and we have written to the VC to expel the students. We are writing to the HRD and Home Ministry to investigate the incident and take action,” said Saurabh Kumar Sharma, ABVB member and joint secretary, JNU students’ union.
Sharma, who is the only ABVP member in the union, said a police complaint has been filed for anti-national activities being organised on the campus.
“How can an event on Afzal Guru, who attacked the temple of democracy, be organised here. We have filed a complaint against unknown people for holding anti-national activities on the campus. I was shown a gun during yesterday’s event while we protested,” Kumar said.
Notably, the university authorities had not given permission to hold any programme supporting Afzal Guru as they “feared” the same might “disrupt” peace on campus.
Student organisers had pasted posters across the campus inviting them to gather for a protest march against “judicial killing of Afzal Guru” and in solidarity with “struggle” of Kashmiri migrants, at varsity’s Sabarmati dhaba.
JNU VC Jagdeesh Kumar said, “Earlier we were told that it is going to be a cultural programme. When I got to know that it is a protest, we decided to cancel the programme as it is administration’s responsibility to ensure peace and calm on campus.”
