The Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union (JNUSU) alleged on Monday that a woman constable assaulted its vice-president Simone Zoya Khan after detaining her from a protest venue. JNU students had gathered outside Jammu & Kashmir Bhawan to protest against the alleged rape and murder of an 8-year-old Kashmiri girl.
Lathi charge
After resorting a lathi charge to disrupt the peacefully protesting students, Ms. Khan was singled out and locked inside a room, where she was “intimidatingly abused and physically beaten up”, the JNUSU alleged
“We were taken from the protest site to Tughlak Road police station. At the station premises, I was dragged inside a room, and punched in the face and beaten,” Ms. Khan alleged.
Reacting to the allegations, Additional Commissioner of Police (New Delhi) BK Singh said the JNUSU’s claims were concocted and malicious.
“The [JNUSU] vice-president assaulted the women police on duty. They [the students] were not at all peaceful and disciplined. They scaled police barricades, blocked traffic and indulged in unruly behaviour. The police acted and handled them with a lot of patience and restraint,” said Mr. Singh.
JNUSU said in a statement that action by the Delhi Police was uncalled for.
“If this is the state of the Delhi Police, who call themselves gender-sensitive, then we can understand what Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao means in our country. State after State, the police have either remained silent by not acting towards incidents of rape, kidnap and murder of women. Be it Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttar Pradesh, were the Bharatiya Janata Party is in power. The police, through their action, have failed to investigate and provide justice for the victims,” the students said.
