[dropcap]T[/dropcap]HE Allahabad High Court today directed the District Magistrate (DM) to ensure all necessary medical assistance and aid, if any required to the students and persons said to be injured as a consequence to the lathi charge or by any other means during the incidence of December 14 & 15 and also subsequent thereto, if any taken place in the campus of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU)
A division bench of the Chief Justice Govind Mathur and Justice Vivek Varma also issued notice to the Uttar Pradesh Government and the AMU administration seeking their reply on a plea seeking directions from the court including to set up a ‘Court Monitored Committee’ to have judicial inquiry into the acts of violence and arbitrary detentions of students by the State Police and the Para Military Forces at Aligarh Muslim University from 12.12.2019 to 15.12.2019.
The court has fixed January 2, 2020, as the next date of hearing.
The petition states that on December 15, 2019, the Para Military Force and the State Police for no just and valid reasons charged Lathi with a massive amount of firing of Tear Gas, Rubber Bullets and Pellets. The forces also entered into Guest House Nos. 2 & 3 where the students were hiding. The entire incident has been recorded by the C.C.T.V. An apprehension has been made for tampering with as well as weeding out of the evidence of the incident taken place in the campus of Aligarh Muslim University.
Violence against the students
In the late evening of December 15, the police and security forces in order to quell the students’ protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 had entered the campus of AMU and allegedly lobbed tear gas shells. As a result of the lathi-charge and firing, many students were injured and admitted to hospitals.
Amid protests and violence against the students, the Vice-Chancellor of AMU had ordered the closure of the university and asked the students to vacate the hostels prior to the scheduled break.
Also, read: Police force against unarmed student protests is a violation of individual fundamental rights
On December 17, 2019, the Vice-Chancellor had issued a statement that he would take all appropriate steps to ensure that allegations of police excesses including damage to vehicles were fully inquired into by the competent authorities”.
Read the Order
[pdfviewer]https://cdn.theleaflet.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/19195306/CRLPA_26085_2019.pdf[/pdfviewer]
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