A fresh set of videos on the violence in Delhi’s Jamia Millia Islamia University during anti-Citizenhsip Act protests in December emerged on Thursday, The Hindu reported. The videos purportedly show protestors hurling stones from inside the campus.
One of the videos, believed to be from December 15, with the time stamp 5.06 pm shows protestors throwing stones right outside the campus as police hurl tear gas shells. Another footage with a 5.18 time stamp shows few people throwing stones from inside the campus with the gate open. In a third video, with 6.55 pm time stamp, Delhi Police officials can be seen escorting students from the university’s new library. Scroll.in has not independently verified these videos.
“The videos suggest that the police exercised restraint even as protestors were throwing stones at them,” a member of the Special Investigation Team, looking into the Jamia violence, told The Hindu. On Thursday, five Jamia students recorded their statements in the investigation. Police said notices were sent to 10 students on Wednesday and six more on Thursday.
The SIT officials visited the campus on Tuesday to inspect the area where the violence broke out on December 15. The special investigation team was set up on Monday to conduct inquiries into videos that reportedly show its personnel assaulting students in the university. The SIT has reportedly asked police stations in Delhi’s Jamia Nagar area to provide duty rosters for the investigation.
One of the videos, tweeted by the Jamia Coordination Committee on February 15, shows the police entering the room – the Old Reading Hall on the first floor of the MA/MPhil section – and indiscriminately hitting students with sticks. After the violence in December, the police had repeatedly denied entering the library.
The other video, also believed to be from the same evening, purportedly shows students hiding in a room. The students were reportedly taking cover after police personnel threw tear gas and stormed the campus, according to the Jamia Coordination Committee, which is a group associated with the students of the university. It has been organising protests against the police violence.
A third clip, released by a company called Maktoob Media, is an extended version of the second video. It shows people, believed to be students, barricading themselves in a room. The police are purportedly seen breaking the door open, and thrashing the students even as several of them plead to be allowed to leave. The footage shows police officials beating the students even as some protect their heads with bags. At the end of the video, a masked policeman is seen breaking a CCTV camera.
Violence had erupted in the area around Jamia Millia Islamia university during an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protest march by the university’s students on December 15. The Delhi Police have been accused of using excessive force to quell the demonstrations and of storming into the campus. The police have earlier claimed that its action on December 15 was justified as the protestors had allegedly injured its personnel and set buses on fire.
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Despite competing claims about Jamia videos, one thing is clear – the police used excessive force
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