The police detained nearly 100 workers of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for protesting outside the Gujarat High Court ahead of the hearing of a case challenging an order of Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) related to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s academic degrees.
“AAP workers were protesting with the demand that details pertaining to PM Modi’s academic degrees should be made public. Nearly 200 workers were protesting outside the Gujarat High Court compound along with shouting of slogans and placards. During the protest, the police came and disburse the party workers and detained nearly 100 of them including senior party leader Kanu Kalsaria,” said Gujarat unit of AAP in a written statement. The police said that later on the detained AAP workers were released.
The AAP workers assembled at Gujarat HC in wake of hearing of the case related to PM Modi’s degree obtained from Gujarat University (GU). A petition in this regard was filed by Gujarat University against the order of the Central Information Commission (CIC) on the degrees earned by Modi. On 29 April, the CIC had directed Delhi University and Gujarat University to provide information to Kejriwal on degrees earned by Modi in 1978 (graduation in DU) and 1983 (post-graduation in GU). In July in 2016, the Gujarat High Court had issued a stay on the CIC's order asking GU to provide information on Modi’s degree to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
The Delhi Chief Minister and AAP supremo Kejriwal had written a letter to Information Commissioner mentioning that why the commission was hiding details related to PM Modi’s educational degree. The letter was treated as RTI application and subsequently GU and DU authorities were asked to provide details on Modi’s degree.
Reacting on CIC’s directive, GU Vice Chancellor MN Patel divulged that Narendra Modi got Master of Arts degree with Political Science as main subject. He was enrolled as external student of GU and obtained the degree in the year 1983, said Patel expressing inability to share mark-sheet as the varsity can’t provide details of records beyond two decades.