Team Clarion
LUCKNOW – Thirteen Banaras Hindu University (BHU) students associated with Bhagat Singh Chhatra Morcha were arrested for attempting to burn copies of Manusmriti at the campus on 25 December.
According to reports, the students held an event at the arts faculty intersection on the BHU campus to commemorate Dr BR Ambedkar’s historic burning of the Manusmriti on the same date in 1927. However, reports spread that the students were planning to burn copies of Manusmriti, and members of the proctorial board of the university tried to stop them.
Manusmriti is a sacred Hindu book which covers subjects such as the social obligations and duties of various castes and individuals in different stages of life.
Students, including some alumni of the prestigious university, also clashed with university officials. Initially, 10 students were apprehended while three were taken into custody later. All the 13 arrested students were produced in a court and sent to jail under judicial custody.
A team of Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) also reached to interrogate the accused to investigate their “connection to the urban Naxalites.” The police lodged the case on a complaint submitted by BHU Chief Proctor Prof SP Singh on December 25.
As the university officials attempted to disperse the crowd and pacify the protesting students, the perpetrators attacked the security guards and vandalised the premises, disrupting government work. The scuffle caused serious injuries to two female security guards, officials said.
Lanka police station Inspector Shivakant Mishra claimed that the complaint mentioned that the students attacked security guards, damaged property, and interfered with government activities which resulted in injuries to the female security personnel with two of them getting treatment at the BHU trauma centre.
On the other hand, eyewitness accounts said that security guards misbehaved with the students, dragged and manhandled them. The students were later detained in the university’s proctorial board office, Maktoob Media reported.
Police booked the students under serious charges, including non-bailable section 132 (assault on a government servant), 121(2) (causing grievous hurt to a government servant), 196(1)(b) (disturbing public harmony), 299 (insulting religion), 110 (attempt to culpable homicide), 191(1) (rioting), and 115(2) (causing intentional hurt).
In a statement, student groups and activists condemned the police action calling it “intimidation” and “witch hunt”.
“This action has been taken at the behest of Brahminical Hindutva fascist forces. The repressive attitude of the BHU administration and the police administration clearly shows that the BJP-RSS is openly behind this. The Indian state which boasts of being democratic is in such a condition that discussing Manusmriti can make you end up in jail,” reads the statement signed by several groups.
It added “Manusmriti is the text which gives women, Shudras and Dalits a status worse than that of an animal, which is against the democratic aspirations of the people of the country. We assert that the illusion of Brahmanical Hindutva forces, to break people’s movement for a democratic society by unleashing state repression, will be shattered to pieces by the broader unity of the oppressed and exploited people. In fact, their illusion is already being broken as 13 student activists raised slogans like Manusmriti Murdabad and Inquilab Zindabad with undeterred spirit while going to jail.”
