Delhi Dalit protests turn shriller, 150 students go on hunger strike

Alleging “delay in justice” to Hyderabad University research scholar, 150 protesting students from varsities across Delhi who were detained earlier on Wednesday decided to go on an indefinite hunger strike at Parliament Street police station here.

According to police, due to security concerns, around 150 students were detained from outside Shastri Bhawan and taken to Parliament Street police station.

“Every time we try to go to the Ministry and raise our demands with HRD Minister Smriti Irani, we are held back and detained by police. Protesting is a basic right. We can’t be denied that at a time when the government is trying to cover up an ‘institutional murder’,” JNU Students Union vice president Shehla Rashid Shora said.

Members of Krantikari Yuva Sangathan (KYS) and Left-backed All India Students Association (AISA) were among the protesters.

Sucheta De, national president, AISA said, “We will not budge from the premises of the Parliament Street police station now and sit on an indefinite hunger strike here till our demands are met.” 

“We are protesting the delay in justice to the student who had to end his life due to the harassment by the institution,” she said and asked “who will be held accountable for similar such suicides in varsities across country which go unreported? 

The protests over the issue have been rocking the national capital since last week with three JNU students sitting on an indefinite hunger strike since Sunday. 

Meanwhile, after a Dalit student of JNU sent letters to its Vice-Chancellor alleging discrimination and threatened to commit suicide, nine more students of the varsity on Wednesday said they are being “harassed on the basis of caste”.

The Dalit student had sent two letters to the VC threatening that he would his life if his research grant is not extended next year.