NEW DELHI: Shards of broken glass, blood stains on stairs, and unclaimed notes and footwear.
The two libraries of Jamia Millia Islamia depicted the police crackdown on students, a day after policemen barged into the university campus in search of protesters who had set on fire public vehicles and indulged in violence nearby.
The police action has been widely condemned.
"These scenes will forever haunt me whenever I will enter the libraries of Jamia Millia Islamia," said a student, one of the victims of the police high-handedness. Flower-pots and broken glasses littered the entrance of Dr Zakir Hussain Library on Monday.
ALSO READ | Jamia crackdown: The ripple effect
"We had run into the library to save ourselves when police barged into the campus. After entering through the main door of the library, we closed it and placed tables in front of it to stop police from entering. But they smashed the glass of the door, climbed through it and came inside," another student, requesting anonymity, said.
Inside the library, empty tear-gas shells lay spread.
Students said they had to break the window panes in the libraries to get fresh air.
Many of them were scared and hid under the tables, some fled to the basement while others to the terrace.
A day later, Parle G biscuit packets, mineral water bottles, books, notes and even caps were lying on reading tables while shards of broken glass littered the floor.
At some places, battered wooden sticks of police lay around, prompting a varsity official to remark, "Look at the extent of the lathicharge. The condition of the stick reveals that they left them behind after caning the students badly".
A room, which houses periodicals, was closed on Sunday but the police even broke its windows to see whether students were hiding there, said the official.
The glass door of another room was also broken by the police using a fire extinguisher, the students said.
They said the reading room, reserved for women students, was also not spared as police asked women to vacate it and were abusive.
The students said it seemed the police had lost all levels of civility and did not care whether they were talking to men or women.
Many students had ran towards the library to shield themselves from the police and said the police got the libraries vacated and asked them to keep their hands up.
Abdul Mannan Khan, a student, said, "I was inside the library when the police barged inside. We were asked to vacate the library. We were even asked by them to switch off our cell phones and not make videos. My phone was taken away. Last I checked, its location was showing Jamia Nagar police station."
There were blood stains on the floor outside the reading room of the library.
A varsity official said the students might have suffered injuries during police lathicharge or during running.
The old reading room had a similar story to tell.
CCTV cameras lay on the floor and blood stains on the stairs and footwear outside the reading room for PhD students.
"It seems the students were injured when they ran barefoot while fleeing from the police.
Students had switched off the lights inside the library so that the police could not find them," said a varsity official.
There were no officials in the old reading room and they reached after receiving SOS messages from the students stuck inside.
"There must have been 200-250 students in the new reading room of the Dr Zakir Husain Library, while 300 students were present in the old reading room," said the official.