Lawyers unearth chilling account of police brutality in AMU

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Lawyers unearth chilling account of police brutality in AMU

However, they met with a very aggressive police force which bombarded on them tear-gas shells and stones

Wednesday December 18, 2019 11:06 PM, ummid.com News Network

New Delhi: A team comprising of three legal experts on Wednesday said police used excessive force against the students of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) inflicting on them serious injuries on Sunday December 16.

The three member team, which included Advocate Aman Khan, Advocate Fazal - both associated with Human Rights Law Network (HRLN), and Fawaz Shaheen of the Quill Foundation, said the police lobbed tear-gas shells, used rubber bullets, stun grenades, pellets and other kinds of explosive weapons into the crowd inside the gate and also hurled communal abuses to incite the students.

AMU students intensified their stir against Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC) on Sunday after receiving the reports of police excesses against their counterparts in Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi.

However, they met with a very aggressive police force which bombarded on them tear-gas shells and stones, the fact finding team said.

“According to all the students interviewed who were present at the site, they along with Proctor kept demanding the armed forces to step outside the university campus. Ignoring their appeal, the armed forces entered the university building including guest house number two and three. They carried out raids in guest houses and mosque and lathi charged the students”, the report said.

“The buildings were also bombarded with tear gas shells that caused suffocation and made several students unconscious. The police and the RAF were using deceptive shelling which would blow up the hands of students when picked up. One student blew up his hand in process and was admitted to ICU ward in JNMC where his hand was amputated”, the report said.

“The police and the RAF then moved towards the boys hostels on Aftab Hall road where armed forces fired indiscriminate tear gas shells. They particularly targeted Sir Syed North Hostel and fired stun grenades and tear gas shells over its closed gates", it said.

"Another surprising, yet horrific act of the armed forces, was vandalizing the bikes and other vehicles belonging to students who had parked them on road. The policemen were also seen lifting the students bikes purportedly for registering cases against them”, the report said.

“Shockingly, the armed forces cut the window fence of room number 46 in Morrison Court Hostel, shattered glass window and fired tear gas in the room from point blank range. As a result, room caught fire and the three students who were in the room but not even part of protest came out in semi conscious state", it said.

"Armed forces then brutally assaulted those students and one Syed Mohammad Mehdi Rizvi is missing since then. (Brother of Mehdi Rizvi was later circulating appeal pamphlets seeking help to locate him).The two other students remain unidentified", the report said.

“All witnesses to whom we spoke recalled the police was hurling insults and abuses of a communal nature at the students and the university at large. These communal abuses were being shouted even before they lathi-charged the protesters”, the lawyers said.

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