On Monday, newly elected JNSU President Sai Balaji, along with JNU professors, went to lodge a police complaint at the Vasant Kunj police station against ABVP leaders who had assaulted several JNU students the previous night.
ABVP and Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) members reportedly gathered outside the police station and threatened to kill Balaji ‘the minute he steps out.’
Professor Jayati Ghosh, who had accompanied Balaji to the police station, said that the ABVP also harassed faculty members.
“They threatened several of my senior colleagues. Their body language was extremely intimidating and they were building around the police station with great confidence. No violence occurred but it was an extremely intimidating and terrifying atmosphere. There were some students from ABVP and some teachers who were formerly with ABVP. But most of them were not people I recognise form the university at all. Right now, we have got police escort with us and we are inside the campus,” she said.
Balaji and the others had to be escorted back to the JNU campus with police protection.
The united front of Left student groups AISA, SFI, AISF and DSF won all four central panel posts in Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union (JNUSU) polls on Sunday. After announcement of the results, ABVP leaders thrashed several students inside the campus hostels.
Balaji revealed that a mob led by ABVP leader Saurabh Sharma was “baiting for blood of any student they thought a friend of Pawan Meena and were attacking students with sticks.”
In a letter shared on his social media handles, Balaji narrated the horrific tale of ABVP’ brutality, “They openly threatened me, Geeta and other students present there with dire consequences if we intervened to stop the violence. The group now turned into a Mob and started attacking Abhinay a former JNU student in Jhelum and chased him and almost lynched him in the lawns.”
“Fearing my safety some students asked me to sit inside the PCR vehicle. However the mob led by Ashutosh Mishra and Saurabh Sharma stopped the PCR vehicle and got a ABVP student to sit beside me…These two students were repeatedly stopping the PCR and threatening me. To my surprise Saurabh Sharma stopped the PCR between Jhelum and Sutlej and the ABVP student sitting inside the PCR van opened the door. Upon opening more threats were given to me and I was physically assaulted inside the PCR van by ABVP students outside.”
Balaji also shared videos where ABVP men can be seen thrashing students and stopping the PCR van in which Balaji was seated.
Professor Ranjani Mazumdar said, “Clearly the police have been instructed by higher ups to not interfere! We now know this from very reliable sources. Both students and teachers are in danger now. This is the state of affairs in the capital city of this country!”
The Indian Express reported that a PCR van entered the JNU campus around 11.30 pm after a security guard informed the police that a “Scorpio car with the name of an ABVP candidate had entered the campus and forcibly picked up a student”.
According to former JNUSU president Geeta Kumari, ABVP created a situation of mob lynching inside the campus on Sunday. She said, “Today our comrades Pawan Kaushik Ashutosh Abhinay were brutally beaten up by ABVP. While i was trying to save Abhinay I was also attacked by saurabh sharma. He pulled my hand and threw on the road at jhelum gate. And when they attacked N sai balaji, i tried to stop them he threatened me that he would cut my neck off.”
“I have been taking this for an year now it’s just impossible to survive like this in the fear of getting beaten up or lynched in my own campus,” Kumari added.
Actor and JNU alumni Swara Bhasker also tweeted about the violence:
Reports of violence from #JNUSU_Election2018 #ABVP cadre is reportedly on campus with swords & laathis, ABVP cadre from DU has been brought in as well. Media and police not being allowed into JNU campus. ABVP is losing the election on ALL seats counted so far. (1)
— Swara Bhasker (@ReallySwara) September 15, 2018
Reports of violence from #JNUSU_Election2018 #ABVP cadre is reportedly on campus with swords & laathis, ABVP cadre from DU has been brought in as well. Media and police not being allowed into JNU campus. ABVP is losing the election on ALL seats counted so far. (1)
— Swara Bhasker (@ReallySwara) September 15, 2018
Also Read: Sai Balaji, The Newly Elected President Of JNUSU Narrates A Horrific Tale Of ABVP Mob Violence