“What more does the police need in terms of evidence? Everything is crystal clear,” said Mohammed Minhajauddin, who was blinded in one eye during the police crackdown at Jamia Millia Islamia on the night of December 15.
Mr. Minhajauddin was among the many students seen in a CCTV video purportedly of the varsity’s research scholars’ library, where police personnel are seen beating up people present indiscriminately. “A few of my friends and I were there since around 2 p.m. We went downstairs for a while and then returned. We even have CCTV footage of this which we have submitted to the court,” he told The Hindu.
Narrating the sequence of events, Mr. Minhajauddin said that by evening, police had entered and spread across the campus, and everyone was in a state of panic. “There were a lot of sounds, and many students had switched off their laptops and were just worried about finding a way out,” he added. With several people having entered the research scholars’ section to seek refuge, the door to the section, which is the only point of entry, was latched from inside.
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“But they (police) banged the door several times, broke the latch and entered,” Mr. Minhajauddin said. After entering, police personnel are in the video seen indiscriminately hitting people with lathis, allegedly without any warning. He said the police gave no instruction to leave the area or anything else, but were simply hitting anyone in sight and were also hurling communal slurs. He added that his fingers were fractured when he was hit by a lathi, and as he tried to escape from the room, he was hit in the left eye and lost his vision.
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While police personnel were hitting people with lathis inside the section, more personnel were allegedly waiting at the door and attacking people as they came out, Mr. Minhajauddin said.
“I started to feel unconscious and somehow made my way to the bathroom,” he said. Mobile footage from the day, showed him bleeding from his face, lying unconscious on the floor of the bathroom along with another student.
“Jamia (Millia Islamia administration) could have released this footage and made everything clear, but they were also worried about the law and order situation,” he said. There was enough evidence to establish police brutality and action must be taken, he added.
Mr. Minhajauddin said he is undergoing treatment at AIIMS to ensure that his other eye does not get infected. Various non-profts had reached out to him and were helping him finance his treatment, he said, adding that he had been recommended to go abroad to seek treatment but was yet to take a decision. He said he has approached multiple authorities to lodge a case in the matter and has also moved the High Court to seek compensation . A notice was issued to authorities on February 11 in this regard, he said.