NEW DELHI: A plan of few JNU students to hold a protest march against the hanging of Afzal guru was foiled by the university authorities, who ordered cancellation of it as they "feared" that the march might "disrupt" peace on campus.
The student organisers had pasted posters across the campus inviting them to gather for a protest march against "judicial killing of Afzal Guru" and in solidarity with "struggle" of Kashmiri migrants, at varsity's Sabarmati dhaba. Members of the ABVP objected to the event and wrote to the Vice Chancellor that such kind of marches should not be held on campus of an educational institution, prompting the university administration to order cancellation of the march.
"Earlier we were told that it is going to be a cultural programme. When I got to know that it is a protest, we decided to cancel the programme as it is administration's responsibility to ensure peace and calm on campus," JNU VC Jagdeesh Kumar told PTI. The students protesting against holding of the march had gathered at the venue and shouted slogans but the varsity officials ensured no untoward incident takes place.
"We sent officials to ensure there is no law and order issue There were some protests within the campus but no untoward incident took place," a senior police official said. The organisers later claimed they went ahead with the programme despite the cancellation of the permission and held a cultural programme, art and photo exhibition on the issue rather than a protest. "We talked about the issues and ended by holding a march till Ganga Dhaba. How come the VC cancelled the permission, which he granted to us a day earlier, after ABVP approached him?" said Umar Khalid, one of the organisers of the protest.
JNU students' union joint secretary Saurabh Kumar, who is the only ABVP member in the union, said, "How can an event on Afzal Guru, who attacked the temple of democracy, be organized here. We will demand expulsion of those who organised it."