Ramjas college violence: students organise ’save DU’ march to protest against ABVP

Mangalore Today News Network

New Delhi, Feb 28 2017:  Scores of Delhi University students and teachers participated in a ’Save DU’ march today to protest against the BJP-linked Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad after it was accused of attacking students and teachers in the university campus last week. This comes a day after ABVP students organised a ’Tiranga’ (Tricolour) march to protest against "anti-national" activities by "left-leaning" students.

Reportedly organised by student bodies affiliated to the Left Front, the march commenced outside DU’s Khalsa College where protestors raised slogans against the ABVP and the Delhi Police over the incident.

"Please don’t call it an AISA march. It is a march of DU students against the hooliganism of ABVP and for freedom of expression and debate," said a Left-affiliated All India Students Association member.

Protestors today allege that ABVP volunteers resorted to violence, thrashing students and lecturers of Ramjas College on February 21 and February 22 for inviting Jawaharlal Nehru University student Umar Khalid. Mr Khalid was accused of organising a pro-Afzal Guru event and charged with sedition last year.

After Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi extended his support to the movement on Twitter, the students’ wing of the party also staged a hunger strike in the DU campus.

"After the Ramjas incident and violence, a majority of students who want a peaceful campus are scared... There is hardly any space for debate," accused Amrita Dhawan, president of the Congress-affiliated National Students Union of India.

"Nothing justifies violence. We live in a democratic country where people can have different opinions," she added.

However, DU student Gurmehar Kaur, who alleged rape threats over her social media posts against the ABVP, did not participate in the march."I have been through a lot and this is all my 20 year old self could take," she said.
But she urged students to participate in the march in "huge numbers".

"The campaign is about students and not me. Please go to the March in huge numbers," said the 20-year-old daughter of an Army officer who was martyred in 1999.

After receiving a letter from the Delhi Commission of Women, the police has registered a case against unknown people over the rape threats to Ms Kaur.