Three days after a Noida youth opened fire at protests in Delhi's Jamia Milia Islamia, unidentified gunmen once again fired shots around the university. According to reports, the incident of firing was reported near Gate number 5 of Jamia Millia Islamia. Locals say two men came on a scooty and fired shots in the air and fled the scene. No casualties have been reported so far. A statement issued by the Jamia Coordination Committee, a group comprising students and alumni of the varsity, said the attackers were on a red scooter. The incident on Sunday night triggered panic in the area. A police vehicle had reached the spot after the incident but was chased away by angry students. Hundreds of students and locals gathered outside the university.
Three FIRs have been filed in connection with two deaths at an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protest at Jalangi town in West Bengal’s Murshidabad earlier this week, ThePrint has learnt. The deaths occurred because of shootings that took place during the protest, and police said local tensions between two groups were to blame. The sequence of events pieced together by police so far suggests that the web of local tensions allegedly culminated in the firing of guns Wednesday — tensions that are believed to have sparked clashes despite the warring sides’ shared resentment against the CAA. The suspects include Tohiruddin Mondal, a local block president affiliated with the Trinamool Congress, who is now at large. The victims were a minor, Salauddin Sheikh, 17, and a cleric named Anarul Biswas, 60.
The shooter who opened fire in Jamia Nagar on Thursday has been sent to preventive custody for 14 days. According to the police, the shooter is being held as a juvenile on the basis of his Class 10 mark-sheet and Aadhaar card. However, the police have moved the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) for a bone ossification test to verify the age of the accused. Once allowed, the age test will be done at RML Hospital in Delhi. Sources say that the police won’t be able to question him for the next 14 days. "We have questioned him for 24 hours and based on the statement he has given, we will question people associated with him," said an officer. The initial round of investigation into the Jamia firing incident has revealed that the teenage shooter was self-radicalised. He has told interrogators of Delhi Police that over the past two years he started reading incendiary posts on social media. The shooter, who brandished a gun in front of Delhi Police personnel on Thursday and shot at a Jamia university student, has told interrogators that every day he would listen to speeches online and share offensive posts. During the questioning, sources say, there was no remorse by the shooter on the crime he committed.
Comedian Kunal Kamra has been banned by four airlines after his confrontation with Republic TV anchor Arnab Goswami aboard an Indigo flight. Kamra had posted a video on Twitter Tuesday where he is seen questioning Goswami on his “journalism” and political views. Following this, Indigo released a statement that said it was banning Kamra for six months due to his “unacceptable behaviour” and also advised passengers “to refrain from indulging in personal slander whilst onboard”. Union Minister for Civil Aviation Hardeep Singh Puri also called his behavior “offensive” and urged other airlines to impose similar restrictions on Kamra. Acting on his advice, indefinite bans by three other airlines — AirIndia, SpiceJet and GoAir — followed.
Filmmakers Anand Patwardhan and Pankaj Kumar have moved the Bombay High Court against the Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF) after their documentary films were not selected to be screened during the festival that opens on January 28. In the petition, the filmmakers contended: “The petitioners state and submit that the common thread that runs through some of the documentaries that were not selected for the competition or exhibition including the petitioners’ documentaries is that they are critical of the current political dispensation and/or critical of the political philosophy that they claim to espouse.” They further alleged that unregulated discretionary powers, including pre-selection process of MIFF, juxtaposed with the fact with the non-selection of all documentaries critical of the current Union government, the political party in power and their political ideology, points towards clear malafide use of discretionary of power.
The Delhi Police booked Sharjeel Imam, an activist who came in limelight during the ongoing protest in Shaheen Bagh, on Sunday for allegedly delivering inflammatory speeches against the amended Citizenship Act and the planned National Register of Citizens, officials said. According to the police, Imam, a resident of Bihar and former Jawaharlal Nehru University student, delivered “very inflammatory and instigatory speeches in his opposition to CAA and NRC”. “He had previously delivered one such speech in Jamia Millia Islamia on December 13 last year and thereafter one even more inflammatory against the government which is being widely circulated on social media,” they said. These speeches have the “potential to harm the religious harmony” and the unity and integrity of India, for which the case was registered against him, police said.
According to the accounts The Caravan heard, at around 6.30 pm, scores of masked people attacked a peaceful gathering being conducted by the JNU Teacher’s Association. The masked mob pelted stones, damaged cars, beat up faculty and students present. The mob then proceeded to vandalise at least three hostels, and beat up the residents. All calls for help to the police personnel deployed at the university since the morning went unheeded; the police even tried to stop an ambulance from leaving the campus. The violence continued for at least 45 minutes and the police blocked all entry and exit into the campus till around 12.50 am. All the accounts blamed the Akhil Bharaitya Vidhyarthi Parishad—the student wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh—for the unprovoked violence.
When the violence began, Tazeem Khan told Al Jazeera, he along with his friends ran towards a guesthouse, nearly 100 metres from Bab-e-Syed. He said they locked the gate of the guesthouse from inside, hoping the policemen would not be able to enter. Khan and eight others hid inside the toilet, from where they could hear the police entering the guesthouse and beating students hiding in the rooms. Two hours later, policemen broke the doors of the toilet. "They beat us mercilessly as if we were criminals," he said.
Lindenthal, a student of the Technical University of Dresden in Germany, was on a two-semester exchange programme at the IIT and had one semester remaining. Lindenthal was quoted by local media as saying he did not know that the protests he participated in were illegal or that he had violated the conditions of having a student visa. "The immigration officer asked me whether I participated in protests as part of discussion, and when I admitted to the fact, she asked me to leave the room. Within a few minutes, I was asked to leave the country," Lindenthal was quoted as saying by the Deccan Herald newspaper. "This is after he featured in Chennai newspapers and social media holding up posters at a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act. I do not know what exactly was said in the conversation with the officials," IIT Chennai representative Panchagnula said.
In Bangalore, Ramachandra Guha, a pre-eminent biographer of Mohandas K. Gandhi and a critic of the citizenship law, was midsentence in speaking to a reporter when helmeted police officers carrying sticks grabbed his arms and dragged him away. It was all captured on video. “Our protest is totally nonviolent,” Mr. Guha said, seconds before he was detained. “See what is happening. You see we are totally peaceful. Did you see any violence?” Mr. Guha was then put into a bus full of other detainees. He was released later in the day.
Students said that Sir Syed North Hostel was targeted by the police. The fact finding has recorded the “disproportionate and extraordinary use of force with malafide intent by the police” at Room no 46 of Morrison Court hostel. Here several students who had not even participated in the protests, were attacked by the police who first beat the guard who had to be admitted to hospital, and then fired tear gas at almost point blank range.
Students of Jamia Millia Islamia in Delhi held a protest march against the Citizenship Act (CAA) this evening that turned violent as at least three buses and several two-wheelers were set ablaze. Batons and tear gas were used as police were seen chasing protesters through the streets. At least 125 people were injured in the clashes through the evening, with varied levels of repercussions. No perpetrators were detained post this violent event, and more than 50 students were detained - some still bleeding and concussed.
Tension remained high in Assam state's biggest city, Guwahati, as four people died in hospital after being shot, while another died when a shop he was sleeping in was set on fire and a sixth after he was beaten up during a protest, the AFP news agency quoted the local officials as saying. Some 5,000 people took part in a fresh demonstration in Guwahati on Sunday, with hundreds of police watching on as they sang, chanted and carried banners with the words: "Long live Assam".
For almost three weeks, students of JNU have been protesting against a 300 per cent fee hike that will come into effect next January. On Monday, the protest took a violent turn as the police used force and detained over 50 students. They were later released. The university did announce a partial rollback but students are unsatisfied and insist on a complete withdrawal of the fee hike.
Taseer, born in Britain but raised in India, lost his Overseas Citizenship of India last week. The home ministry announced on Twitter that the journalist had “concealed” the fact that his father was Pakistani. Critics have, however, called the move a response to a Taseer cover story on Modi in Time magazine during the Indian election titled “India's divider-in-chief”.
IIT-Madras student Fathima Latheef committed suicide on 9 November in her hostel room. Her family has accused the administration of discriminatory behaviour on religious grounds. The student unions are on protest, demanding a fair probe into the matter with at least two students sitting on hungerstrike. The students are demanding an internal inquiry and a grievance redressal committee to be set up.
Violent clashes broke out between two student groups outside Ramjas College, leaving many injured on Wednesday – a day after the ABVP forced the suspension of a conference ‘Cultures of Protest’ where JNU student Umar Khalid was scheduled to speak.
Dr Prasanta Chakraborty, Assistant Professor at the Department of English of the University of Delhi has been badly assaulted by ABVP goons for participating in the demonstration. He was taken to Hindu Rao hospital.
Hyderabad’s English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU) has barred two University of Hyderabad (UoH) students from taking PhD entrance test next week. Kavyasree Raghunath and M S Mansi said that they were not given any explanation in writing but EFLU Proctor Prof Kona Prakash cited their participation in protests at UoH for the move. Raghunath and Mansi are Ambedkar Students Association office-bearers and allegedly participated in protests at the UoH after Dalit PhD student Rohith Vemula’s suicide in January 2016.
Almost two weeks after a lecture by JNU professor Nivedita Menon snowballed into a controversy over her alleged remarks about Kashmir and the Indian Army during a conference held on the Jai Narain Vyas University campus in Jodhpur, the varsity on Thursday suspended Rajshree Ranawat, an assistant professor in the English department who was a key organiser of the event.
Police arrested JNU student union leader, Kanhaiya Kumar, and a former teacher, S.A.R. Geelani, in apparently politically motivated cases. On February 15, a member of Delhi state legislature from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and others were filmed physically assaulting Kumar’s supporters in a New Delhi court while police stood by.