Anti-India slogans raised in AMU: 1200 Kashmiri students threaten to leave university if sedition charges not dropped

Sedition charges have been slapped against three AMU students.

ALIGARH: A group of Kashmiri students studying at the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) in Uttar Pradesh has threatened to leave for their homes on October 17 if the sedition charges pressed against them are not dropped.

According to reports, AMU students' union former vice-president Sajjad Rathar has written a letter to the AMU vice-chancellor in which he said that more than 1,200 Kashmiri students will leave for their homes in the Kashmir Valley on October 17 ''if this vilification does not stop''.

Rathar also termed the sedition charges slapped against three Kashmiri students as "vendetta".

In his letter, Rathar said, ''The option of holding Namaaz-e-Janaza (prayer meeting) in absentia was dropped after the AMU authorities did not give the permission."

"If no prayer meeting was held as confirmed by all official agencies, the slapping of a case of sedition against three Kashmiri students is simply a vendetta, harassment and denial of justice," he alleged. 

Rathar's letter was handed over to AMU Proctor Mohsin Khan in presence of large number of Kashmiri students at his office on Saturday night.

Meanwhile, AMU spokesman Shafay Kidwai has rejected the Kashmiri students' charges of harassment and stressed that "no innocent would be framed".

Prof. Kidwai also made it clear that "there is zero tolerance for any anti-national activity on AMU campus".

It may be recalled that three Kashmiri students of AMU were booked on sedition charges for allegedly for raising "anti-India" slogans and trying to hold a prayer meeting for Hizbul Mujahideen commander Manan Bashir Wani on October 12.

Twenty seven-year-old Wani, pursing a PhD course in Allied Geology at the AMU, had quit the university and joined militant ranks in January this year. 

He was killed in an encounter at Shatgund village in Handwara area of north Kashmir's Kupwara district on Thursday.

Aligarh's Senior Superintendent of Police Ajai Sahni said police took the action after a video surfaced showing the three Kashmiri students raising "anti-India" slogans.

"Police have filed an FIR against Wasim Malik, Abdul Mir and one unnamed person. They have been identified on the basis of a video recording," he said.

Prof Kidwai said show-cause notices have been issued to nine students for trying to hold an unauthorised gathering Thursday. 

The university has also set up a three-member inquiry committee to probe the incident. 

The panel has been asked to submit a report in the next 72 hours.

The three students were suspended from the AMU earlier.

The matter came to light after some AMU students from Kashmir gathered near Kennedy Hall on the campus to hold funeral prayers for Wani, following which the varsity staff and the students union leaders had rushed to the spot and tried to stop them.

A heated exchange erupted between the students union leaders and the Kashmiri students and they finally moved out of the area, Kidwai said, adding three Kashmiri students were suspended for trying to hold the "unlawful" gathering.

Meanwhile, BJP lawmaker from Aligarh, Satish Gautam has said that those who tried to hold a prayer meeting for Wani on the AMU campus should be expelled. 

(With PTI inputs)