NEW DELHI: Many students and demonstrators were detained by Delhi Police on Saturday for holding a public gathering at Arts Faculty of Delhi University to welcome Professor GN Saibaba back after his acquittal. Police officers were stationed outside the faculty campus before the event. “This afternoon some students affiliated with All India Students’ Association (AISA) and other left organisations started gathering outside the Arts Faculty, Delhi University.
They didn’t get permission to organise the event. Despite requesting them to disperse, the students kept on protesting,” said Deputy Commissioner of Police (North) Sagar Singh Kalsi. “All the protesters were removed from the faculty area and taken in police buses and other official vehicles,” said the DCP. He added that the protestors misbehaved with the police and security staff of the university.
However, a female protester alleged that the police personnel manhandled them and tore their clothes while detaining them. A female police constable also manhandled Professor Nandita Narain, who was also one of the speakers at the event.
Reacting to this, she said this is a vicious crackdown by the Delhi Police. “Students and professors who were peacefully protesting against the stay on the acquittal and wrongful incarceration of our professor, G N Saibaba were brutally detained, beaten up and manhandled,” AISA National Working General Secretary Prasenjeet.
A professor at the event also raised the question of the entry of police inside the campus. She asked, “Who allows the police to enter the university campus? Don’t we have the right to protes t s i lent ly in our university?” The DCP said, “We acted after the university authorities gave in writing to take legal action against the protestors.”
COURT ORDERED SAIBABA’S RELEASE FROM JAIL
The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court on Friday acquitted Saibaba and ordered his release from jail, noting that the sanction order issued to prosecute the accused in the case under the stringent provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act was “bad in law and invalid”. The high court also allowed the appeals filed by five other convicts, acquitting them of all charges. The prosecution had moved the apex court against the acquittal.