Dalit scholar’s suicide: JNUSU members start hunger strike from police station

Three JNU students, including former JNUSU president V Lenin Kumar, are on their fourth day of hunger strike. The protesting students — under the banner of Joint Action Committee-Delhi — said they were picked up before they could reach MHRD. Some students also alleged lathicharge by the police.

Watch video: Delhi Police’s brutality on protesting students outside RSS head quarters

“We detained 150 protesters from outside MHRD but were later let off. There was no lathicharge as the police personnel did not have batons or lathis,” said a senior police official. Countering the claim, Kanhaiya Kumar said the protesters were beaten inside the police station.

“We were marching peacefully, but were still detained and beaten. Every time we have protested, the police have detained and later released us, but we refuse to fall into this pattern. I, along with other students, are joining in the indefinite hunger strike. The police should either let us go back to MHRD or put us in jail, we won’t leave the police station otherwise,” said Kumar. JNUSU vice-president Shehla Rashid Shora said the detention was “completely unprovoked”.

“It’s shameful and unjustified that the police had to use disproportionate force and unprovoked violence on students. For some reason, men and women were detained separately,” she said.