New Delhi: With Delhi police blaming JNUSU president Aishe Ghosh and her associates of creating violence at Sabarmati hostel at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), India Today’s Special Investigation Team has nailed the possible assailants, who, by their own admission, had engineered the assault on the Left-leaning students with the support from the right-wing groups outside.
The attackers on camera have confessed that they mobilised the mobs from within and outside the campus. A first-year student of the French degree program at the JNU, Akshat Awasthi identified himself in footage of Sunday’s attack — and as an activist of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).
Akshat Awasthi, the JNU’s online records show, is a resident of the Kaveri hostel on campus.
Armed with a stick, his face covered with a helmet, Awasthi showed the video and said he could be seen rushing through the hostel corridors in maddening rage and knocking anything and anyone that came his way.
“What did you have in your hand?” an India Today undercover reporter asked Awasthi.
“It was a stick, sir. I pulled it out from a flag lying near [the] Periyar [hostel].”
As the mystery deepened over the identity of the attacker’s organisation, the self-identifying assailant revealed his affiliation and the motive behind the raid.
Awasthi said the attack occurred in retaliation for an assault allegedly perpetrated by the Left students on Periyar hostel the same day earlier. “It was a reaction to their action.”
Asked how he was able to organise mobs in a matter of hours, Awasthi named office-bearers of the ABVP from a separate campus outside.
“He’s an organizational secretary of the ABVP. I called him. Left-wing students and teachers were holding a meeting at Sabarmati. When Sabarmati was attacked, they all ran away and took shelter inside,” Awasthi explained.
He recounted how mobs smashed vehicles and furniture on a street facing the Sabarmati hostel.
“All students and teachers standing there ran away when the attack happened. They had no idea that the ABVP would ever retaliate like this,” he said.
“You were telling us that 20 of the ABVP activists belonged to the JNU and 20 others were mobilised from outside,” the reporter asked Awasthi.
“I can tell you that I did all the mobilization. They don’t have that much mind. You know you need to act like a superintendent or a commander. Why it’s to be done and where exactly. I guided them about everything — where to hide, where to go. I told them to do everything systematically. I didn’t have any position or a tag. Still they listened to me carefully,” the student claimed.
India Today’s SIT also filmed Akshat Awasthi during ABVP demonstrations that took place on JNU campus a day after the raid.
A fellow student in the first year of the French program also testified to his involvement in the criminal assault on January 5.
The student, Rohit Shah, confessed that he gave his helmet to Awasthi before he set out on the raid. “It [a helmet] is a must for safety when you smash glass,” Rohit Shah said.
He said the mobs spared an ABVP room in the hostel after he informed them about the affiliation of its residents.
Asked why the mobs masked their faces, the student said the tactic was copied from Left attacks on campus.
“We copied it. The Left came with the masks. So, we said let’s be masked.”
Akshat Awasthi identified several other people, including a masked woman, in the mob.
Another student, identified as Geeta Kumari was asked why did she close the server room, the AISA activist said, “Our VC does everything online, sends love letter [slang] online, sends Happy Near Year online, sends warnings online, so we thought that he has exceeded everything, there are no exams, none of our demands is met, he didn’t even meet us, so we decided to close the server room so that the administration does not function.”
