New Delhi: Yet another video of alleged police brutality in Jamia Millia Islamia emerged Monday even as police maintained that it is trying to establish the exact sequence of the events after analysing all the clips that have surfaced on social media.
In the fresh video, the police can be seen raining batons on students who are trying to escape. Women students can be seen moving out while pleading with the police and one of the policemen can be seen breaking a camera.
Police, however, said it will not be appropriate to declare anyone guilty or innocent without a proper investigation.
Three videos had emerged online earlier, two months after the December 15 violence at the campus. While one video purportedly showed paramilitary and police personnel thrashing students in the library, two other videos, which appeared hours later, showed some youths with covered faces entering the library
Special Commissioner of Police (Crime Branch) Praveer Ranjan said that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the December 15 violence will analyse all the video clips to establish the exact sequence of the events leading to that day’s incident.
“Once the sequence of events is established, we will identify all those involved in the violence and action as per law will be taken. By just seeing the videos being released on social media, it will not be appropriate to declare at this point of time that those present inside the Jamia campus or its library were innocent,” the special commissioner said.
The Jamia Coordination Committee issued a statement saying that it was not in possession of the latest video or any other such footage as the administration denied it access citing that they will be sharing relevant footage with the people concerned when approached through official channels.
“The students who are being seen in these videos have clearly gone through a lot in the past two months. The humiliation, pain and horror is still fresh in their minds. Many students in the videos are seen shaking inconsolably and panicking in a terrorised state and have taking psychiatric help,” the statement said.
The father of a student, who was present in the library on that day, said that the police were baton-charging students who were trying to escape.
“My son was among the sea of students who were trying to escape… Outside the library, the police and the CRPF baton-charged students and my son suffered fractures in his legs. He is still recovering,” the father informed.
Mohammad Minhajuddin, who had lost vision in one of his eyes, due to the alleged police action, said many of the students were wearing handkerchiefs due to the effect of tear gas.
“A presumption is being made that they were protesters who wanted to hide their faces. It is not the case. Even policemen were wearing handkerchiefs because of the same reason,” he said. He was in the 48-second video released by the JCC in the early hours on Sunday.
PTI
