A day after pro-Afzal Guru slogans were raised in Kolkata’s prestigious Jadavpur University, two groups of students split along ideological lines brought out rallies in varsity campus on Wednesday and vowed to go any distance to preserve their ideologies even as the Union Home Ministry demanded a report from the State Government on the incident that took place inside campus, sources said.
The members of a left leaning students’ union on Tuesday had — in support of JNU students — raised anti-India slogans and fixed posters demanding freedom for Jammu & Kashmir, Manipur and Nagaland.
In an apparent domino effect of the Tuesday’s incident, a group of students from the Engineering Department went on rampage inside the University campus targeting the opposition group and tearing off posters and hoardings and threatening to “take the agitation to its logical end if the anti-national elements did not pay heed to reasons.”
While a large number of students said they had not seen a similar incident in the past, Vice Chancellor Suranjan Das said “there could be certain fringe elements that might have resorted to some extreme acts, but that is not the culture of Jadavpur University. We encourage healthy debates” but it will not allow anything that is unacceptable to the nation as a whole.
“We are Indians and will never tolerate slogans that advocate its disintegration. Those who will raise such slogans will have to pay dearly for the treachery shown to the mother land,” said one of the students tearing down banners that loudly demanded “Azadi for Kashimr, Azadi for Manipur, Azadi for Nagaland.”
Incidentally BJP leader Rahul Sinha also chipped in on Wednesday saying “those who raise anti-India slogans should be beaten up in public.”
Incidentally Nirjhar Mukherjee, the student leader who had led another group of students on Tuesday said they were never against Indian State and were patriots like any other Indian.
“Some fringe elements may have given raised slogans but we are against such slogans,” he said adding what he demanded was an “Azadi or freedom from intolerance.” He said “before we are misrepresented we must say that unlike what is being said about us we want freedom from this saffron intolerance in Kashmir, in Bihar, in Kerala in Manipur and all other places.”
He said the slogans like “Afzal bole, Azadi, Geelani bole Azadi and Chinke lenge Azadi” were raised by fringe elements.
A palpable fear pervaded JU campus as the rival groups of students flocked at various corners to chalk out their future plans. The police had still not been called in to restore normalcy.