Attack on campus pre-planned, V-C role should be investigated

New Delhi: A week after the violence in JNU, a fact-finding committee of the Congress on Sunday alleged that the attack inside the university campus was preplanned. The committee recommended that Vice-Chancellor M Jagadesh Kumar should be dismissed immediately alleging that he was the mastermind behind the violence.

"A criminal investigation should be initiated against V-C, the company that provides security service and members of the faculty who conspired with the attackers to unleash the violence at Sabarmati hostel, Periyar hostel, and other places, recommended the committee. It also said that the Delhi Police Commissioner should also be held accountable for the violence.

The Congress had appointed the four-member fact-finding committee to carry out a detailed inquiry into the violence at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).

Sushmita Dev, the member of the committee, recommended a complete rollback of the JNU fee hike while adding that there should be a proper consultation between the administration and the students on the fee and other issues.

According to the committee report, the attack inside the JNU was a pre-planned, pre-mediated, criminal conspiracy and there should be an independent inquiry of the V-C administrative decisions including all the appointments in faculty.

"We also made phone calls to JNU V-C, messaged him to know his view about the incident but no reply came from his side," said Dev.

The fact-finding committee report revealed that the mob that attacked the students and teachers on campus were from the right-wing factions. Dev further said that they have sufficient evidence that the people who were attacked on January 5 did not belong to the right-wing politics on campus.

"The attackers, in fact, did not touch the students and faculty who were right-wingers at the Sabarmati hostel area," she added.

"The mob that entered the hostel even targeted people of a certain religion and spared those who were well-known ABVP activists," Dev said.

Questioning the investigation in the case, the committee said that the quality of the investigation was questionable where till now a case for an attempt to murder has not been filed despite serious head injuries suffered by students and faculty. During interaction with students, the committee found that the forensic team came about 40 hours later to the hostel that was attacked.

The other members of the fact-finding committee are Hibi Eden, MP, and former NSUI president; Syed Naseer Hussain, MP and former president of JNU NSUI; and Amrita Dhawan, a former NSUI president, and ex-DUSU president.