JNU students recall the sequence of violence on black Sunday: first person accounts

Less than three weeks after attack on the students of Jamia Millia University by a violent mob and Delhi Police, around 100 masked ABVP men and women carrying lathis, rods, hammers and stones chanting ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’ brutally attacked Jawaharlal Nehru University students and professors, injuring at least 20 students and two professors on Sunday evening. They have been admitted at the AIIMS Trauma Centre and amongst them were JNU Student Union president Aishe Ghosh, Professor Sucharita Sen and assistant professor Ameet Parameshwaran

Most students were protesting the registration for the next semester for which the last day was Sunday and several of them had not appeared for the recently concluded Semester exams. It was for these exams that the JNU VC Jagadish Kumar had released a circular stating that students could submit their answer sheets on Whatsapp or as images to their professors.

“The trouble began to brew around 4.30 pm near Periyar Hostel where a number of men and ABVP goons had converged to plan this violence. It being a Sunday, not many noticed that there was a group congregating. By the time the news spread and the professors attempted to reach the spot, the several masked ABVP goons had reached the Sabarmati T-Point around 6.30 pm. And they went on a rampage. They began by pelting stones as soon as the people approached them to diffuse the situation. That’s when several of us ran away. The Delhi Police simply watched the goons attacking students,” pointed out Bharat, a JNU student.

Soon enough, images of a conversation planning the violent attack in a WhatsApp group ‘Friends of RSS’ were shared online. It has been reported that a JNU faculty is a member of this group.

“Several students were attacked at Periyar hostel and we convinced our warden to allow us to shelter the boys. There was an IANS reporter also who was also thrashed by the goons. He went to the policemen on the campus to complain, but they pushed him around too, instead of providing him security. Then the goons moved to Sabarmati Hostel. They broke the windows and glass doors at the entrance itself,” underscored Kaushiki, who did not want to share her surname.

“One of the first casualties of the attack was Aishe. The mob was targeting her and they kept hitting us though we had fallen on the ground,” said an eye-witness who did not want to be named. An ambulance which was on its way to help the students was also ransacked by the mob.

At Sabarmati Hostel, the mob was targeting certain rooms which had Kashmiri Muslims and Dalits. IF they saw that the door of a room had either a national flag or had something in saffron, it was not broken down. “When they were across our room on the ground floor, they saw a picture of Bob Marley on the door. There were seven of us inside. The goons broke the windows and were attempting to push open the door too. Though we are left-leaning, we are not involved in any politics. All of them were masked and some of them who saw us asked the lathi-wielding people to leave us alone. So, they did not break open the door. This means that there were students also along with the mob, otherwise how did they know about us. But, they were not this sparing with several others in the hostel,” said a student from Haryana, who did not want to be named.

The mob had rampaged rooms on the first and second floors of the hostel. There were broken shards of glass lying everywhere. The AC cooler had been toppled on the ground floor. The room of a Kashmiri Muslim was ransacked as was that of several Dalit students Several of the rooms were locked because the students were out meeting professors as it was a Sunday.

“The lights were switched off in the hostel as soon as the noise of the violence reached us. Several of us ran back to our rooms and locked the doors. The goons did not break open doors which had locks outside. They targeted other rooms. My room was on the first floor and they smashed the windows of my room with a hammer. I was hiding in the room with a bucket on my head as I did not want to get injured. We had nothing to safeguard ourselves. There has been no wi-fi in the campus for the last three three days and the mobile connectivity was also weak on Sunday, so I could not speak to anyone,” said a student, who did not want to be identified.

The JNU VC and the students have been in a confrontational mode after the hostel fee hike. Tension had been on its rise on campus; on January 4 and 5, members of both the right-wing ABVP and Leftist union accused each other of being attacked. The JNU Teacher’s Association had called the students to solve the issue and to appeal for calm.

“This is unlike anything we have ever seen. This was an organised attack and the security along with the police stood by as spectators watching the terror that was unleashed. There is no doubt that they were goons of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and its parent organisation Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. We had attempted to go to the hostels to ensure the students were safe, but we got caught in between the attack,” said Prof Rakesh Batabyal.

“They attacked the New Transit House, the faculty quarters, near Sabarmati. There were several foreign teachers staying there and one from Brazil was in the block when the attack happened. She called us in panic and we all told her to switch off the lights and stay put. Thankfully, nothing happened to her,” said another professor of the foreign languages department.

Several professors and students on campus were aghast to find recently recruited teachers being part of the marauding brigade. “The warden of Periyar Hostel Tapan Bihari and Buddha Singh were seen along with the ABVP goons. It shocked us that our teachers would do this to us,” said several students.

By the time the word got around of the violence, Delhi residents turned up at the main gate of the university and in front of the police headquarters at ITO in solidarity. The civil society marched from the North gate to the West Gate and then back to the North Gate, which was locked to prevent media and others to enter. After the initial shock wore off, the students marched to the main gate from Sabarmati T-point chanting slogans against fascism and thuggery of the ruling party.

Eventually, by 1.30 am, the main gate of the University was opened to a rousing crowd.