Two Students Federation of India (SFI) activists, including district unit president K.M. Arun, were hacked allegedly by a three- member hired gang near the Mahatma Gandhi University gates on Friday. The other victim was identified as Sachu Sadanand, SFI unit secretary on the Mahatma Gandhi University campus.
SFI district president Brijesh K. Babu alleged that the attack was in retaliation to a skirmish between SFI activists and Youth Congress (YC) activists at Kuriakose Elias College at Mannanam on Friday morning. According to him the college union had collected art works by students and showcased them as posters on the campus as part of International Women’s Day celebrations on Thursday.
The YC members had staged a protest march alleging that some of the works displayed were inappropriate.
The SFI activists later attended a meeting of the district unit in the afternoon and two of them were returning to the MGU campus on a bike when a three-member team that followed them in a car hacked them with country swords.
Both Arun and Sadanand suffered injuries on their right arm and were admitted to the Kottayam Government Medical College Hospital.
Brijesh K. Babu said a eyewitness identified the the attackers as Arun Gopan, accused in the Shaji murder case in Kannur. His accomplices were identified as Shibi and Shine.
The police found the car in which the attackers came abandoned at a petrol pump nearby.
