Hindutva mob storms Jadavpur University in Kolkata, injures many students
Kolkata: Many students were injured after a Hindutva mob entered Kolkata’s Jadavpur University and vandalised properties at midnight in Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled West Bengal state.
According to Kashmir Media Service, tensions mounted at the university after Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), backed by Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and other right-wing groups attacked students in the camps.
Unrest gripped the campus early Thursday morning when videos circulated on WhatsApp showing a mob breaking doors of the campus and entering. The mob was also raising slogans.
Speaking to media, Indranuj Ray, a student of Jadavpur University and member of the Revolutionary Students’ Front (RSF), said around midnight men on bikes entered the campus, thrashed students and vandalised the student union rooms and hostels.
“The locks were broken. The students at the hostel are resisting with all their might and not letting these goons enter the hostel areas. Police were on standby, not intervening,” he said.
“CCTV control rooms were attacked; footage is being destroyed. VC remains unresponsive, and police, when contacted through emergency numbers, are hanging up calls,” Ray added.
Several students were admitted to the nearby KPC Medical College Hospital in injured condition.
The Students’ Federation of India (SFI), Srijan Bhattacharya, all India secretary of the CPI-M-backed students’ union, said that the ABVP men created trouble by sponsoring attacks on students when the governing body meeting was held on Wednesday night.
No SFI students were there during the incident, Srijan told the media.
The trouble started on the intervening night of Wednesday and Thursday when the governing body meeting called by the Left-backed student unions and the Faculty of Engineering and Technology Students Union (FETSU) was held inside the campus.
RSS-backed ABVP men protested against the meeting being held inside the campus and got involved in a clash with the Left students.
Videos, circulating on WhatsApp, showed a group of men belonging to the Hindutva ABVP trying to break into locked facilities while raising slogans, media reports said.
Citing the incident of damaging the statue of Lenin at Jadavpur by ABVP supporters recently, the SFI national general secretary said the ABVP students were trying to create an environment of trouble inside the university campus but the students won’t be trapped by their strategy.
